Jean Webster

Born Alice Jane Chandler Webster in Fredonia, New York, Jean Webster studied at Vassar College and began writing fiction, essays, and journalism in the early 1900s. She wrote with an easy, conversational style that made her characters feel bright, funny, and real.

Her most famous books, Daddy-Long-Legs and Dear Enemy, follow spirited young women as they grow in confidence and independence. Alongside the charm and romance, her work often reflects a serious interest in education, poverty, and social reform.

Webster also supported women’s education and women’s suffrage, and her concern for children in institutions shaped some of her best-known themes. She died in 1916, not long after the success of Daddy-Long-Legs, but her fiction has continued to reach new generations of readers.