Elizabeth and Her German Garden

Elizabeth and Her German Garden is a novel by the Australian-born writer Elizabeth von Arnim, first published in 1898. It was very popular and frequently reprinted during the early years of the 20th century. The book earned over £10,000 in the first year of publication, with 11 reprints during 1898; by May 1899, it had been reprinted 21 times. The book is the first in a series about the same character, "Elizabeth". It is noteworthy for originally being published without a named author. Von Arnim insisted that she must remain anonymous because she claimed her husband, the German aristocrat Count , whom she satirises in the book, would have found it unacceptable for his wife to write commercial fiction. Although the book is semi-autobiographical, the novelist E.M. Forster, who lived at the von Arnim estate in 1905, working as a tutor to the family's children, wrote that there was in fact not much of a garden. "‘The German Garden itself ... did not make much impression.’ ... ‘[The house] appeared to be surrounded by paddocks and shrubberies’ while ‘in the summer’, he notes, ‘some flowers – mainly pansies, tulips, roses [appeared] ... and there were endless lupins ... [that] the Count was drilling for agricultural purposes’. But, Forster adds, ‘there was nothing of a show’."