(Shropshire 1881 - St. Leonards on Sea 1927) was an English novelist and poet. She began writing when she was ten years old, but always ended up burning all her poems. However, once her brother read one and without telling her, he took it to the Shrewsbury Chronicle, which published it anonymously. Mary was amazed at the warm reception it received. From the age of twenty, Mary Webb had developed Graves-Basedow disease, and that suffering, as well as her longing for Shropshire, would inspire her for Precious Bane (1924). Despite winning the Prix Femina Vie Heureuse with this novel, she did not achieve success until after her early death in 1927, when Prime Minister Stanley Baldwin referred to her as "a forgotten genius".
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