Stephen, Sir Leslie, 1832–1904, English author and critic. The first serious critic of the novel, he was also editor of the great Dictionary of National Biography from its beginning in 1882 until 1891. In 1859 he was ordained a minister. As a tutor at Cambridge his philosophical readings led him to skepticism, and later he relinquished his holy orders. He wrote several essays defending his agnostic position, notably Essays on Free Thinking and Plain Speaking (1873). He moved from Cambridge to London in 1864 and three years later married Harriet Marian, younger daughter of Thackeray Thackeray, William Makepeace (thăk`ərē), 1811–63, English novelist, b. Calcutta (now Kolkata), India.
..... Click the link for more information. . Some of the essays and sketches Stephen wrote for various periodicals were collected in Hours in a Library (1874–79). From 1871 to 1882 he was editor of Cornhill Magazine; during this time he encouraged such authors as Thomas Hardy Hardy, Thomas, 1840–1928, English novelist and poet, b. near Dorchester, one of the great English writers of the 19th cent.

The son of a stonemason, he derived a love of music from his father and a devotion to literature from his mother.
..... Click the link for more information. , Robert Louis Stevenson Stevenson, Robert Louis, 1850–94, Scottish novelist, poet, and essayist, b. Edinburgh. Handicapped from youth by delicate health, he struggled all his life against tuberculosis. He studied law and was admitted to the bar in 1875, but he never practiced.
..... Click the link for more information. , and Henry James James, Henry, 1843–1916, American novelist and critic, b. New York City. A master of the psychological novel, James was an innovator in technique and one of the most distinctive prose stylists in English.

He was the son of Henry James , Sr.
..... Click the link for more information. . Throughout his life Stephen was a prominent athlete and mountaineer. He wrote numerous articles on the subject of mountain climbing, many of which were collected in The Playground of Europe (1871). His major works include History of English Thought in the Eighteenth Century (1876); biographies of Johnson (1878), Pope (1880), Swift (1882), George Eliot (1902), and Hobbes (1904), all written for the "English Men of Letters" series; Science of Ethics (1882), which attempted to combine ethics with Darwin's theory of evolution; Studies of a Biographer (1898–1902); and The English Utilitarians (1900). Virginia Woolf Woolf, Virginia (Stephen), 1882–1941, English novelist and essayist; daughter of Sir Leslie Stephen . A successful innovator in the form of the novel, she is considered a significant force in 20th-century fiction.
..... Click the link for more information. was the younger of his two daughters by his second wife, Julia Jackson.

Bibliography

See biography by F. W. Maitland (1906, repr. 1968); studies by N. G. Annan (1951) and D. D. Zink (1972).

Stephen, Sir Leslie

(born Nov. 28, 1832, London, Eng.—died Feb. 22, 1904, London) English critic and man of letters. After attending Eton College and Cambridge University, he gained entry to literary circles and in 1871 began an 11-year tenure as editor of The Cornhill Magazine, for which he wrote literary criticism. His greatest learned work was his History of English Thought in the Eighteenth Century (1876), but his most enduring legacy is the Dictionary of National Biography, which he edited from 1882 to 1891, personally writing many hundreds of its meticulous articles. He was the father of Virginia Woolf and the painter Vanessa Bell (1879–1961).