Richard Doddridge Blackmore (June 7, 1825 - January 
20, 1900), usually known as R. D. Blackmore, was 
one of the most famous English novelists of his 
generation.

Blackmore was born at Longworth, Berkshire, of 
which parish his father was vicar. Like John Ridd, 
the hero of Lorna Doone, he was educated at 
Blundell's School, Tiverton, and at Oxford. He 
practised for a short time as a lawyer but an early 
marriage with a beautiful Portuguese girl, and a 
long illness, forced him to live for some years in 
hard and narrow circumstances. Happily, in 1860, he 
came, unexpectedly, into a considerable fortune. 
Settling down at Teddington, he divided his life 
between the delights of gardening and the pleasures 
of literature; cultivating his vines, peaches, 
nectarines, pears, and strawberries, and writing, 
first, sensational stories, and then historical 
romances. His first publication was Poems by 
Melanter (1853), followed by Epullia (1855), The 
Bugle of the Black Sea (1855), etc.; but he soon 
found that fiction, not poetry, was his true 
vocation. Beginning with Clara Vaughan in 1864, 
he produced fifteen novels, all of more than 
average, and two or three of outstanding merit. 
Of these much the best in the opinion of the 
public, though not of the author, is Lorna 
Doone (1869), the two which rank next to it being 
The Maid of Sker (1872) (the author's favourite) 
and Springhaven (1887). Others are Cradock Nowell 
(1866), Alice Lorraine (1875), Cripps the Carrier 
(1876), Mary Anerley (1880), and Christowell 
(1882).

Blackmore acted as the pioneer of the new romantic 
movement in fiction which Robert Louis Stevenson 
and other brilliant writers afterwards carried on. 
One of the most striking features of his writings 
is his marvellous eye for, and sympathy with, 
Nature. He may be said to have done for Devonshire 
what Scott did for the Highlands. He has been 
described as "proud, shy, reticent, strong-willed, 
sweet-tempered, and self-centred."

Lorna Doone is the most famous of his heroines, but 
in Cradock Nowell, a fine tale of the