Ingrid Mathilda Kruse Malling, known as Mathilda Malling, and even better known by her early pen name, Stella Kleve, was a Swedish novelist born January 20, 1864, on her family's farm, in North Mellby Parish, Kristianstad County, Sweden and died in København, Esajas sn, Sjælland, Copenhagen in 1942. Daughter of Danish estate owner, Frans Oskar Kruse, and Anna Maria Mathilda Borgström, she graduated from Lyceum for Girls in Stockholm, then studied at Lund University, in Switzerland, in 1884, and in Copenhagen, 1885–1886. In 1883 and was married in 1890 to merchant Peter Malling in Copenhagen.