Evelyn Charles Henry Vivian (1882 — ) was the pseudonym of Charles Henry Cannell, an British editor and writer of fantasy and supernatural, detective novels and stories. Prior to becoming a writer, Cannell was a former soldier in the Boer War and journalist for
The Daily Telegraph. Cannell began writing novels under the pen-name "E. Charles Vivian" in 1907. Cannell started writing fantastic stories for the arts magazine
Colour and the aviation journal
Flying (which Cannell edited after leaving the
Telegraph) in 1917—18, sometimes publishing them under the pseudonym "A.K. Walton".Vivian is best known for his Lost World fantasy novels such as
City of Wonderand his series of novels featuring supernatural detective Gregory George Gordon Green or "Gees" which he wrote under his "Jack Mann" pseudonym. Vivian also wrote several science-fiction stories, including
the novel
Star Dust about a scientist who can create gold.Critic Jack Adrian has praised Cannell's lost-world stories as
"bursting with ideas and colour and pace", and
"superb examples of a fascinating breed".Influences on Vivian's work included Rider Haggard, H.G. Wells, Arthur Machenand the American novelist Arthur O. Friel. Vivian also published fiction under severalother pseudonyms, including Westerns as "Barry Lynd". Adrian has noted that some of the pseudonymsCannell used
"will never now be identified".For younger readers, Vivian wrote
Robin Hood and his Merry Men, a retelling of theRobin Hood legend.
Vivian also edited three British pulp magazines. From 1918 to 1922 Vivian edited
The Novel Magazine, and later, for the publisher Walter Hutchinson (1887-1950),
Hutchinson's Adventure-Story Magazine (which serialized three of Vivian's novels) and
Hutchinson's Mystery-Story Magazine. .
Outside the field of fiction, Vivian was noted for the non-fiction book,
A History of Aeronautics.