Edgar Alfred Jepson (1863 - 1938) was an English writer, principally of mainstream adventure and detective fiction, but also of some supernatural and fantasy stories that are better remembered. He used a pseudonymR. Edison Page for some of his many short stories, collaborating at times with John Gawsworth and possibly Arthur Machen, a long-term friend.
He was editor for a short period of Vanity Fair, where he employed Richard Middleton, and did much to preserve the latter's memory. He was also a translator, notably of the Arsène Lupin stories of Maurice Leblanc.
He was a member of the Square Club (from 1908) of established Edwardian authors, and also one of the more senior of the New Bohemians drinking club.
As a literary dynast: his son Selwyn Jepson 1899-1989 was known as a crime writer; his daughter Margaret (married name Birkinshaw) published novels as Margaret Jepson (including Via Panama) and as Pearl Bellairs; and Margaret's daughter Franklin is the writer Fay Weldon. The Jepson domestic arrangements are commented on second-hand in Weldon's autobiographical writing.
Works
Sir Jones (as Jean F. Darrell Poges)
Sibyl Falcon (1895)
The Keepers of the People
On the Edge of Empire (1899) with David Beames
The Dictator’s Daughter (1902)
The Horned Shepherd (1904)
Lady Noggs, Peeress (1905) children’s stories
The admirable tinker : child of the world (1904)
The Four Philanthropists (1907)
Tangled Wedlock (1908)
The Mystery of the Myrtles (1909)
The Girls’ Head (1910)
House On The Mall (1911)
Pollyooly (1911) children's stories
Captain Sentimental and other stories (1911)
Lord Lisdor (1910)
No.19 (1910)
The Man with the Black Feather by Gaston Leroux (1912) translator
Terrible Twins (1913)
The second Pollyooly book. (1914) children's stories
The triumph of Tinker
Alice Devine (1916)
The Professional Prince (1917)
Ann Annington (1918)
Prince In Petrograd (1922)
Lady Noggs Assists (1924)
Buried Rubies (1926)
The Loudwater Mystery (1926)
Emerald Tiger (1928)
Cuirass Of Diamonds (1929)
The Moon Gods (1930)
Memories of a Victorian (1933) Autobiography
Memories of an Edwardian and Neo-Georgian (1937) Autobiography
External link
Edgar Jepson’s Garden (http://homepages.pavilion.co.uk/users/tartarus/jepson.html)
Jepson proves to be an odd study in contrasts, he wrote popular novels that were, if not best sellers at least enough in demand to make for a relatively comfortable existence for the author and his family.
Jepson geared his essay to illume precisely why verses that contain lines such as "his hair was fl as a sheep's wool that is fl" ought to be called many things, but "poetry" is not one of the things that they should be called.
Jepson's memoirs indicate a passion for all that is great and awe-inspiring in literature, both in poetry and in prose.
EdgarJepson's long and productive career spanned the Yellow Nineties through the Edwardian and Neo-Georgian periods of British letters.
Jepson authored articles, reviews, short stories, novels, and even wrote propaganda bits during the Great War.
Jepson also served as editor or contributor to a number of the finer literary journals including Vanity Fair, The Saturday Evening Post, The Smart Set, and numerous others.
Feeds |
Contact