Eleanor Alice Burford Hibbert

Eleanor Alice Burford Hibbert
Nationality and residence:	English.
Born:	September 1, 1906 in Kensington, London, England.
Died:	January 18, 1993 at sea, somewhere between Greece and Port Said, Egypt.
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Eleanor Alice Burford Hibbert's Pseudonyms
Eleanor Burford	Maiden name (1941-1962).
Jean Plaidy	Pseudonym (1945-1993).
Elbur Ford	Pseudonym (1950-1953).
Kathleen Kellow	Pseudonym (1952-1960).
Ellalice Tate	Pseudonym (1956-1961).
Anna Percival	Pseudonym (1960).
Victoria Holt	Pseudonym (1960-1993).
Philippa Carr	Pseudonym (1972-1993).

Biography

Personal life

Eleanor Alice Burford was born in September 01, 1906 – not in a romantic manor house, or even on a windswept Cornish moor, but in the prosaic South London suburb of Kensington. Her father, Joseph Burford, was something of an odd-job man, with no steady profession, but he quickly passed on his great love of books to his young daughter. She was an avid reader from the age of four onwards.

She was also captivated by the city of her birth. "I consider myself extremely lucky to have been born and raised in London," she later wrote, "and to have had on my doorstep this most fascinating of cities with so many relics of 2000 years of history still to be found in its streets. One of my greatest pleasures was, and still is, exploring London. Circumstances arose which brought my school life to an abrupt termination, and I went hastily to a business college where I studied shorthand, typewriting and languages. And so I had to set about the business of earning a living."

In her early twenties, she married a leather merchant, George Percival Hibbert (she was his second wife), who shared her love of books and reading. "I found that married life gave me the necessary freedom to follow an ambition which had been with me since childhood; and so I started to write in earnest."

She died on January 18, 1993 at sea, somewhere between Greece and Port Said, Egypt.

Writing career

At first, Eleanor tried to emulate her literary heroes – the Brontës, George Eliot, Charles Dickens, Victor Hugo and Leo Tolstoy – and during the 1930s she completed nine long novels, all of them serious psychological studies of contemporary life. However, none of these were accepted for publication.

She published her first novels in 1941 under her maiden name: Eleanor Burford, under this pseudonym she signed 32 novels until 1962.

In 1948, she signed her first book under the prolific pseudonym Jean Plaidy, used to published historical novels.

From 1950 to 1953, she signed 5 novels as Elbur Ford, from 1952 to 1960 she used the pseudonym Kathleen Kellow to signed 8 novels, and since 1956 to 1961, she signed 5 novels as Ellalice Tate.

In 1960, she signed one novel as Anna Percival and her first novel as the pseudonym Victoria Holt, eserved to sign her popular gothic romances.

She created her last pseudonym Philippa Carr in 1972.