E. C. Vivian

Evelyn Charles Henry Vivian (1882 – 21 May 1947( 1947-05-21)) was the pseudonym of Charles Henry Cannell, a British editor and writer of fantasy and supernatural, detective novels and stories.

Biography

Prior to becoming a writer, Cannell was a former soldier in the Boer War and journalist for The Daily Telegraph. Cannell began writing novels under the pen-name "E. Charles Vivian" in 1907. Cannell started writing fantastic stories for the arts magazine Colour and the aviation journal Flying (which Cannell edited after leaving the Telegraph) in 1917–18, sometimes publishing them under the pseudonym "A.K. Walton".^[1] Vivian is best known for his Lost World fantasy novels such as City of Wonder ^[2] and his series of novels featuring supernatural detective Gregory George Gordon Green or "Gees" which he wrote under his "Jack Mann" pseudonym. Vivian also wrote several science-fiction stories, including the novel Star Dust about a scientist who can create gold.^[3] Critic Jack Adrian has praised Cannell's lost-world stories as "bursting with ideas and colour and pace", and "superb examples of a fascinating breed".^[4] Influences on Vivian's work included Rider Haggard, H.G. Wells, Arthur Machen and the American novelist Arthur O. Friel.^[1] Vivian also published fiction under several other pseudonyms, including Westerns as "Barry Lynd". Adrian has noted that some of the pseudonyms Cannell used "will never now be identified".^[1] For younger readers, Vivian wrote Robin Hood and his Merry Men, a retelling of the Robin Hood legend.

Vivian also edited three British pulp magazines. From 1918 to 1922 Vivian edited The Novel Magazine, and later, for the publisher Walter Hutchinson (1887–1950), Hutchinson's Adventure-Story Magazine (which serialised three of Vivian's novels) and Hutchinson's Mystery-Story Magazine.^[5] In addition to UK writers, Vivian often reprinted fiction from American pulp magazines such as Adventure and Weird Tales in the Hutchinson publications.^[1]

Outside the field of fiction, Vivian was noted for the non-fiction book, A History of Aeronautics.^[1]

Some of the popular errors about his life are now corrected in the first and only full-length biography, The Shadow of Mr Vivian: The Life of E. Charles Vivian (1882-1947) by Peter Berresford Ellis, PS Publishing Ltd, Hornsea, UK, 2014.

Works

Gees Series

Fields of Sleep was reprinted in the August 1949 issue of Famous Fantastic Mysteries, under the title "The Valley of Silent Men"

The Ninth Life, under the "Jack Mann" byline, was reprinted in the April 1950 issue of A. Merritt's Fantasy Magazine

Another "Jack Mann" novel, Her Ways Are Death, was reprinted in the June 1952 issue of Famous Fantastic Mysteries

• Gees First Case (1936)
• Grey Shapes (1937) http://www.globusz.com/ebooks/GreyShapes/index.asp
• Nightmare Farm (1937)
• The Kleinart Case (1938)
• Maker of Shadows (1938)
• The Ninth Life (1939)
• Her Ways Are Death (1940)
• The Glass Too Many (1940)

Others

• Robin Hood (1906)
• The Shadow of Christine (1907)
• The Woman Tempted Me (1909)
• Wandering of Desire (1910)
• Following Feet (1911)
• Passion-Fruit (1912)
• Divided Ways (1914)
• The Young Man Absalom (1915)
• The Yellow Streak: A story of the South African veld (1921)
• City of Wonder (Fantasy, 1922)
• Fields of Sleep (Fantasy, 1923)
• Broken Couplings (1923)
• The Guarded Woman (1923)
• A Scout of the '45 (Historical Novel, 1923)
• People of the Darkness (Fantasy, 1924)
• Barker's Drift (1924)
• The Lady of the Terraces (Fantasy, 1925)
• Ash (1925)
• Star Dust (1925)
• A King There Was (Fantasy, 1926)
• The Passionless Quest (1926)
• The Forbidden Door (Fantasy, 1927)
• Robin Hood and His Merry Men (1927)
• Shooting Stars (Film Adaptation, 1928)
• Man Alone (1928)
• Nine Days (1928)
• The Moon and Chelsea (1928)
• The Tale of Fleur (Fantasy, 1929)
• Woman Dominant (Fantasy, 1930)
• Guardian of the Cup (1930)
• One Tropic Night (1930)
• Double or Quit (1930)
• Delicate Fiend (1930)
• Unwashed Gods (1931)
• Innocent Guilt (1931)
• And the Devil (1931)
• Infamous Fame (1932)
• False Truth (1932)
• Girl in the Dark (1933)
• Coulson Goes South (Fantasy, 1933)
• Ladies in the Case (1933)
• The Keys of the Flat (1933)
• Shadow on the House (1934)
• Accessory After (1934)
• Dead Man's Chest (1934)
• Jewels Go Back (1934)
• Cigar for Inspector Head (1935)
• Seventeen Cards (1935)
• The Capsule Mystery (1935)
• With Intent to Kill (1936)
• The Black Prince (Historical, 1936)
• Who Killed Gatton? (1936)
• Tramp's Evidence (1937)
• 38 Automatic (1937)
• Evidence in Blue (1938)
• The Rainbow Puzzle (1938)
• Touch and Go (1939)
• Problem by Rail (1939)
• The Impossible Crime (1940)
• The Man With the Scar (1940)
• And Then There Was One (1941)
• Curses Come Home (1942)
• Dangerous Guide (1943)
• Samson (1944)
• She Who Will Not- (1945)
• Other Gods (1945)
• Arrested (1949)
• Vain Escape (1952)

Westerns

(as Barry Lynd)

• Dude Ranch (1938)
• Trailed Down (1938)
• Riders to Bald Butte (1939)
• Ghost Canyon (1939)
• The Ten-Buck Trail (1941)
• George on the Trail (1942)

Non-Fiction

• The British Army from Within (c1914)
• A History of Aeronautics (1921)

Footnotes

References

• Jack Adrian,"Vivian, E(velyn) C(harles)", in the St. James Guide To Fantasy Writers, edited by David Pringle. St. James Press, 1996,pp. 577–80.
• Ashley, Mike (1977). Who's Who in Horror and Fantasy Fiction. New York: Taplinger. p. 176. ISBN 0-8008-8278-4. 
• Bleiler, Everett (1948). The Checklist of Fantastic Literature. Chicago: Shasta Publishers. p. 275. OCLC 1113926. 
• Clute, John; John Grant (1997). The Encyclopedia of Fantasy. New York: St. Martin's Press. p. 988. ISBN 0-88184-708-9. 
• John Clute; Peter Nicholls. The Encyclopedia of Science Fiction. New York: St. Martin's Press. ISBN 0-312-13486-X.
• Tuck, Donald H. (1978). The Encyclopedia of Science Fiction and Fantasy. Chicago: Advent. p. 439. ISBN 0-911682-22-8. 

External links

• E. C. Vivian at the Internet Speculative Fiction Database
• Works by E. C. Vivian at Project Gutenberg
• Works by or about E. C. Vivian at Internet Archive
• E. C. Vivian at Manybooks.net