George Eliot (1819-1880) was the pseudonym of Mary Anne Evans, born in 1819 in Warwickshire, England, and the youngest of five children. Mary Anne was afforded the privileges of a private education, and enjoyed books and learning from a young age.

In 1849 she settled in London and took up work as sub editor of Westminster Review. Under Eliot's control the Westminster Review enjoyed success. She became the centre of a literary circle, one of whose members was George Henry Lewes, who would be her companion until his death in 1878.

Eliot's first collection of tales, Scenes Of Clerical Life, appeared in 1858 under the pseudonym George Eliot. It was followed by her first novel, Adam Bede, a tragic love story in which the model for the title character was Eliot's father. The book was a brilliant success. Her other major works include The Mill On The Floss (1860), Silas Marner (1861). Romola (1861), Daniel Deronda (1876) and her greatest novel Middlemarch (1871-72).

Elliot died of a kidney ailment on December 22 1880 and was buried in Highgate Cemetery.