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Edith Sitwell was born in Scarborough, Yorkshire, of aristocratic but eccentric parentage of Lord George Sitwell and ex-socialite Lady Ida Sitwell of Renishaw Hall . She would later claim that she was descended from the Plantagenets. She had two younger brothers, Osbert and Sacherevell Sitwell . Her relationship with her parents was stormy at best, especially when her father locked her into an iron frame to "correct" her supposed spine deformation. In her later autobiography she said that her parents had always been strangers to her.

Sitwell left for London at the age of twenty-five with the governess Helen Rootham. In London she moved into a fourth-floor flat in Pembridge Mansions , Bayswater.

She published her first poem The Drowned Suns in the Daily Mirror in 1913 and between 1916 and 1921 edited Wheels, an annual poetic anthology.

She became a proponent and supporter of innovative trends in English poetry and opposed what she considered the conventionalism of many contemporary backward-looking poets. She was an unusual sight herself, having angular features resembling Queen Elizabeth IElizabeth I ( September 7, 1533 March 24, 1603) was Queen of England and Queen of Ireland from November 17, 1558 until her death. Sometimes referred to as The Virgin Queen or Good Queen Bess Elizabeth I was the fifth and last monarch of the Tudor dynasty, and being six feet (183 cm) tall, but mainly because she often dressed in an unusual manner with gowns of brocade or velvetThis article is about velvet, the fabric. For other uses of the word, see velvet (disambiguation). Velvet is a form of textile that is woven on a special loom. It is a tufted fabric in which the cut threads are very evenly distributed, giving it its disti or gold turbanThe Turban (Arabic imamah Persian dulband is a headdress, of obscure Oriental origin, consisting of a long scarf wound round the head or an inner hat. Early Persians wore a conical cap sometimes encircled by bands of cloth, which may be considered one ofs with jewelled braceletA bracelet is an article of clothing or jewelry which is worn around the wrist. Bracelets can be manufactured from cloth or metal, and sometimes contain rocks, wood, and/or shells. Although the term 'armlet' may be technically similar, it is taken to means. Her flat became a meeting place for people that would later become the so-called Bloomsbury groupThe Bloomsbury group or Bloomsbury Set or just "Bloomsbury" as its adherents ("members" is probably too formal a designation) would generally refer to it, was an English group of artists and scholars that existed from around 1905 until around World War II.

She was most interested by the distinction between poetryPoetry is an art form in which human language is used for its aesthetic qualities in addition to, or instead of, its notional and semantic content. It consists largely of oral or literary works in which language is used in a manner that is felt by its use and musicMusic often an art/ entertainment, is a total social fact whose definitions vary according to era and culture," according to Jean Molino. 1 It is often contrasted with noise. According to musicologist Jean-Jacques Nattiez: "The border between music and no, a matter explored at 1923 in FaçadeA facade (sometimes just facade is the exterior of a building especially the front, but also sometimes the sides and rear. The word comes from the French language, literally meaning " frontage" or " face". In architecture, the facade of a building is ofte, published in 1922, and set to music by William Walton, with many poems being most esoteric in manner. The performance of the Façade was performed behind a curtain with a hole in the mouth of a painted face and the words were recited through the hole with the aid of a megaphone. The public received the first performance with bemusement with less than favourable critiques from luminaries like Noel Coward; she would not speak with Coward for the next forty years.

She reputedly also disliked D.H. Lawrence because she thought that the author had used the Renishaw Hall as a model in Lady Chatterley's Lover. She never married, but made poet Dylan Thomas her protégé . She received a Royal Society of Literature medal in 1933.

During World War II, Sitwell retired to Renshaw with her brother Osbert and wrote under the light of oil lamps. She knitted clothes for their friends who served in the army. One of the beneficiaries was young Alec Guinness, who received a pair of seaboot stockings.

In 1948 Sitwell toured USA with her brothers and recited her poetry in a large gold dress. She became a Dame of the British Empire in 1954. In 1955 she converted to Roman Catholicism. She also wrote a biography of Queen Elizabeth and afterwards called her "the old bore". In her 70's she was confined to wheelchair. Her last poetry reading was in 1962.

Edith Sitwell died in 1964 at the age of 77.