'Countess who? Mary Annette Beauchamp was born in Kirribilli in 1866. She married a German count, acquiring the name “von Arnim”. When she published her first book in 1898, Elizabeth in her German Garden, the author was simply “Elizabeth”, but these days her 22 books are all attributed to Elizabeth von Arnim. She grew up in England from the age of three, and lived in Europe and America, dying in South Carolina in 1941.' (Introduction)