She also collaborated with her youngest brother, Herbert, Shakespearian scholar and dramatic critic.
It was in Sussex that the Martin Pippin stories were eventually to be located.Īt 18, Farjeon (whose maternal grandfather was American actor Joseph Jefferson) wrote the libretto for an operetta, Floretta, to music by her older brother Harry (who later became a composer and teacher of music). During World War I, the family moved to Sussex where the landscape, villages and local traditions were to have a profound effect upon her later writing. A holiday in France in 1907 was to inspire her to create a story of a troubadour, later refashioned as the wandering minstrel of her most famous book, Martin Pippin in the Apple Orchard.
She describes her family and childhood in her autobiographical work, A Nursery in the Nineties (1935).Īlthough she lived much of her life among the literary and theatrical circles of London, much of Fargeon's inspiration came from her childhood and from family holidays. Her father encouraged her writing from the age of 5. She was educated at home, spending much of her time in the attic, surrounded by books.
The daughter of Maggie (Jefferson) and popular novelist Benjamin Fargeon, Eleanor came from a literary family her 2 younger brothers, Joseph and Herbert Farjeon, also became writers, while the eldest, Harry Farjeon, was a composer.Įleanor, known to the family as "Nellie", was a small, timid child, who had poor eyesight and suffered from ill-health throughout her childhood. Farjeon was born in London, England, on 13 February, 1881.