{{Short description|British writer and translator}} {{Infobox writer | name = Lilly Frazer | image = Lilly_Frazer_writer_died_1941.png | imagesize = | caption = 1907 by Lucien Hector Monod | pseudonym = | birth_date = 1854 or 1855 | birth_place = Alsace | death_date = 8 May 1941 | death_place = Cambridge | occupation = | nationality = French | period = | genre = | subject = | movement = | debut_works = | influences = | influenced = | signature = | website = | footnotes = }} '''Lilly Frazer''' previously '''Lilly Grove''' became '''Lilly, Lady Frazer''' born '''Elisabeth Johanna de Boys Adelsdorfer''' (1854 or 1855 – 8 May 1941) was a French-born British writer and translator.
==Life== Lilly Grove was born in Alsace on 24 November in either 1854 or 1855. Her mother is unknown, but her father was a French merchant named Sigismund Adelsdorfer.<ref>{{Cite web |title=Frazer, Lilly (? 1855-1941), writer and translator, wife of Sir James George Frazer - archives.trin.cam.ac.uk |url=https://archives.trin.cam.ac.uk/index.php/frazer-lady-lilly-grove-1854-5-1941-writer-and-translator |access-date=2022-12-27 |website=archives.trin.cam.ac.uk}}</ref> She first married a British master mariner and they had two children.
She became a widow with two children and she turned to writing. She had little experience, it was her second language, but she was pushy and she obtained a commission from ''The Badminton Library of Sports and Pastimes'' to create what was the first encyclopedia of dance.<ref name=orb>{{Cite ODNB |title=The Oxford Dictionary of National Biography |date=2004-09-23 |url=http://www.oxforddnb.com/view/article/66458 |pages=ref:odnb/66458 |editor-last=Matthew |editor-first=H. C. G. |place=Oxford |doi=10.1093/ref:odnb/66458 |access-date=2022-12-27 |editor2-last=Harrison |editor2-first=B.}}</ref> ''Dancing'' by Mrs Lilly Grove was published in 1895.<ref>{{Cite book |last=GROVE |first=MRS LILLY |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=lXRXfYMqAX0C |title=DANCING |date=1895 |language=en}}</ref>
In 1896 Grove married the anthropologist James George Frazer. She perceived that his reputation was not equal to his abilities. She had the pushiness that he lacked and she became his manager and publicist guarding access to his office. He didn't care too much for prizes but she valued them. She was particularly involved in publishing his work in France, where she translated, and to children, where she adapted his stories.<ref name=orb/> She adapted Frazer's ''The Golden Bough'' as a book of children's stories, ''The Leaves from the Golden Bough''.<ref name="Ackerman1987">{{cite book|first=Robert|last=Ackerman|title=J G Frazer: His Life and Work|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=s_k4AAAAIAAJ&pg=PA124|date=10 December 1987|publisher=CUP Archive|isbn=978-0-521-34093-9|page=124}}</ref><ref name="Kessler2013">{{cite book|first=Gary|last=Kessler|title=Fifty Key Thinkers on Religion|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=itOoAgAAQBAJ&pg=PA54|date=March 2013|publisher=Routledge|isbn=978-1-136-66241-6|page=54}}</ref><ref>{{cite journal |title=Leaves from the Golden Bough |journal=Nature |date=December 13, 1924 |volume=114 |issue=2876 |pages=854–855 |doi=10.1038/114854b0 |bibcode=1924Natur.114R.854. |s2cid=4110636 }}</ref>
On her own account she became involved in the teaching of French at the Perse School for Boys in Cambridge. She created works to assist the teaching particularly in the aural-oral method which she favoured. She also wrote a witty book imagining a world where the middle classes did not have servants.<ref name=orb/> This 1913 book was called ''First Aid to the Servantless''.<ref>{{Cite book |last=Frazer |first=Lilly Grove |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=_mxDAQAAMAAJ |title=First Aid to the Servantless |date=1913 |publisher=W. Heffer & Sons Limited |language=en}}</ref>
Frazer died in Cambridge a few hours after her husband.<ref name=orb/>
==References== {{reflist}}
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{{DEFAULTSORT:Frazer, Lilly}} Category:1850s births Category:1941 deaths Category:Year of birth uncertain Category:People from Alsace Category:British women writers Category:British translators