Crawford, Francis Marion

Crawford, Francis Marion

(1854–1909) writer; born in Bagni di Lucca, Italy (son of Thomas Crawford). He was educated in the U.S.A. and at European universities. Soon after the immediate success of his first novel, Mr. Isaacs (1882), he moved to Italy. An inveterate traveler, he used foreign settings in dozens of popular historical romances and adventure novels, many of which he adapted for the stage. He wrote the drama Francesca da Rimini (1902) especially for Sarah Bernhardt.

The Cambridge Dictionary of American Biography, by John S. Bowman. Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1995. Reproduced with permission.