Stella Gibbons was born in January 1902, into a melodramatic, violent family who were not dissimilar to the Starkadders in her novel Cold Comfort Farm (1932). She was the first of three children born to Telford Gibbons, a doctor, and his wife Maudie; and she spent her whole life in the Hampstead area of North London. Stella was close to her mother and brothers, but her father and grandfather made her childhood miserable with their self-dramatizing scenes and emotional outpourings. Telford was depressive, tyrannical and a drunkard; he once threw a knife at Maudie, and he had a series of affairs with the governesses and maids he employed. As a young girl, Gibbons sought refuge in literature. She began writing poetry at 1…
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Citation: Hammill, Faye. "Stella Gibbons". The Literary Encyclopedia. First published 28 March 2001; last revised 22 August 2022. [https://staging.litencyc.com/php/speople.php?rec=true&UID=1730, accessed 24 November 2024.]
