Radclyffe Hall (1880-1943) is best known as the author of the controversial lesbian novel, The Well of Loneliness. Court cases led to the book being banned in both the United Kingdom and the United States. The American verdict was overturned on appeal, but the book remained unpublished in the United Kingdom until 1949.

Radclyffe Hall was born Marguerite Radclyffe Hall on August 12, 1880, at Christchurch, Bournemouth, England. In later life she was called John by her friends and M. Radclyffe Hall or simply Radclyffe Hall in her books. Her mother, Marie, was American and her father, Radclyffe Radclyffe Hall--or Rat-was British. Her parents divorced in 1882 and Marie remarried a musician, Albert Visetti, whom Radclyffe Hall did not like.

Hall's first romantic attachment was to a singer called Agnes Nicholls, who boarded with her mother. After she came of age and inherited her grandfather's considerable fortune, Hall visited her American family...