Havelock Ellis

Havelock Ellis (Henry Havelock Ellis), 1859-1939, English psychologist and author. He became a qualified physician but devoted himself to scientific study and writing. Although the first volume of the Studies in the Psychology of Sex (7 vol., 1897-1928; completed ed. 4 vol., 1936) was banned on charges of obscenity, the series—Ellis's major work—constituted a valuable contribution to the study of sex problems and had an important influence in changing the public attitude toward them. In 1891, Ellis married Edith Lees. The story of their marriage is the chief theme of his My Life (1940). His other works include, besides poems and essays, A Study of British Genius (1904), The Dance of Life (1923), and Man and Woman (rev. ed. 1934).

Bibliography: See biographies by J. S. Collis (1959) and A. Calder-Marshall (1960).

Ellis, Henry Havelock (1859–1939), qualified as a physician, although much distracted by his literary pursuits. He edited the unexpurgated Mermaid Series of Elizabethan dramatists (1887–9). In 1884 he met Olive Schreiner, who became an intimate friend and who shared his interest in progressive thought, particularly in the realm of sexuality, the subject with which he is most closely identified. An energetic pioneer in the field of sexology, his works (which include The New Spirit, 1890; Sexual Inversion, 1897, with J. A. Symonds; Affirmations, 1898; The Dance of Life, 1923; and his autobiographical My Life, 1939, as well as many other volumes on the psychology of sex, marriage, censorship, social hygiene, etc.) had a considerable and liberating influence. He had many followers, although the scientific accuracy of his investigations has been questioned, and he damaged his own reputation by indiscriminate publication and by his apparent misunderstandings of Freud.