Frances Hugdson Burnett

The years 1850-1910 are said to be the golden ages of children’s literature in England. Poetry, novels and adventure stories were written for children during that time. Many children’s books were written “to give children spontaneous pleasure, and not primarily to teach them” (Darton, Harvey: Children’s Books in England: Five centuries of social life. CUP 1966. So do also the works by Frances Hodgson Burnett. She was born in November 1849 in Manchester and died in October 1924 in New York. She wrote over twenty children’s novels. The most famous ones are Little Lord Fauntleroy written in1886, Sara Crewe or What Happened at Miss Minchin's published in 1888 and The Secret Garden published in1911.