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Catherine Sinclair (17 April 1800 – 6 August 1864) was a Scottish novelist and writer of children's literature. ==Life== Catherine Sinclair was born in Edinburgh on 17 April 1800, the fourth daughter of Sir John Sinclair, 1st Baronet and Lady Diana Macdonald. Catherine died unmarried. Sir George Sinclair, 2nd Baronet, John Sinclair (1797–1875), and William Sinclair (1804–1878) were her brothers. She was her father's secretary from the age of fourteen till his death in 1835.〔 From 1814 to 1818 she lived at Ormeley Lodge, Ham.〔 (number 20)〕 She was an aunt of the novelist Lucy Bethia Walford.〔ODNB entry for Walford, Lucy Bethia. (Retrieved 4 August 2013. Pay-walled. )〕 She then began independent authorship, her first works being children's books, prompted by interest in her nephew, the Hon. George Boyle, 6th Earl of Glasgow. Her story of two anarchic children, in ''Holiday House, A Book for the Young'', successfully engaged the imagination of her young readers. This work was a popular and a notable example of the genre, and a departure from the moralising approach of contemporary works. The book also encapsulates a fantasy tale of fairies and giants. On the subject of children's literature, she says in her preface, "But above all we never forget those who good humouredly complied with the constantly recurring petition of all young people in every generation, and in every house, — 'Will you tell us a story?'" Sinclair's activities in Edinburgh included charitable works such as the establishment of cooking depots in old and new Edinburgh, and in the maintenance of a mission station at the Water of Leith. She was instrumental in securing seats for crowded thoroughfares, and she set the example in Edinburgh of instituting drinking fountains, one of which bore her name and stood at the city's West End before it was removed as an obstruction to trams in 1926. She is noted as being the discoverer of Sir Walter Scott's authorship of "The Waverley Novels" which were originally written anonymously. She died at the vicarage, Kensington, the residence of her brother, Archdeacon John Sinclair on 6 Aug. 1864, and was interred in the burying-ground of St. John's Episcopal Church, Edinburgh. Her portrait was drawn in crayons by James Archer, R.S.A. (cf. Cat. ''Third Loan Exhib''. No. 620).〔 A monument was erected to her memory on the SE corner of St Colme Street in Edinburgh's New Town (just north of Charlotte Square). The inscription is, "She was a friend of all children and through her book 'Holiday House' speaks to them still."〔The monument was modelled loosely on the Scott Monument as she was a major contributor to the funding of that monument. 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Catherine Sinclair」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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