AustLit

Ethel Knight Kelly was a Canadian actor who came to Australia in 1903 for the Australian season of a J. C. Williamson play. However, after she married in Melbourne later that year, she left the stage and settled in Australia. She became a well-known socialite and was also involved in fundraising for charitable causes. After World War 1 she edited the women's pages of Smith's Weekly. From the mid-1920s she spent ten years in Italy, where most of her books were written. She returned to Australia in 1934. She was the sister-in-law of W. H. Kelly (q.v.).