Born in Margate, England, the illegitimate daughter of British multi-millionaire Sir John Ellerman, Bryher resisted gender and marriage conventions throughout her life. Best known as the lifelong same-sex partner of H. D., Bryher also served as a major patron, funder, and advocate of modernism in literature, film, politics, and psychoanalysis. She founded/co-founded three presses, a film production company, and two magazines, Close Up (1927–1933) and Life and Letters Today (1935–1950). Her works include two memoirs, two poetry collections, five non-fiction books, four films, and sixteen autobiographical or historical novels which explore gender roles and issues of national and international upheaval and progress. In 1933, Bryher published ‘What Shall You Do in the War?’ then directly assisted 105 refugees, many psychoanalysts, from Nazi rule.