Evelyn Sybil Mary Eaton (22 December 1902 – 17 July 1983) was a Canadian novelist, short-story writer, poet and academic known for her early novels set in New France, and later writings which explored spirituality.
Educated at the Netherwood School in Rothesay, New Brunswick, Heathfield School in Ascot, England, and at the Sorbonne in Paris, Eaton rejected many of the social conventions of her time and class, giving birth out of wedlock to a daughter while at the Sorbonne.
A series of novels set in New France followed, as did a teaching appointment at Columbia University from 1949 to 1951, a Visiting Lecturership at Sweet Briar College, Virginia from 1951 to 1960, and a position as Writer in Residence with the Huntingdon Hartford Foundation in 1960 and 1962.
A series of short stories published in The New Yorker, four more novels, a volume of poetry, and a Ballet-oratorio would grow out of Eaton's continuing promotion of what she believed were First Nations' spiritual practices.
In 1966, the Evelyn Sybil Mary Eaton Collection, a repository for her books, manuscripts, and personal papers, was established in the Mugar Memorial Library at Boston University.