Dame Antonia Susan Duffy ( Drabble; born 24 August 1936), known professionally by her former marriage name as A. S. Byatt ( ), is an English critic, novelist, poet and short story writer. Her books have been widely translated, into more than thirty languages. After attending the

University of Cambridge The University of Cambridge is a public collegiate research university in Cambridge, England. Founded in 1209 and granted a royal charter by Henry III in 1231, Cambridge is the world's third oldest surviving university and one of its most pr ...

, she married in 1959 and moved to

Durham Durham most commonly refers to: *Durham, England, a cathedral city and the county town of County Durham *County Durham, an English county * Durham County, North Carolina, a county in North Carolina, United States *Durham, North Carolina, a city in N ...

. It was during Byatt's time at university that she began work on her first two novels, subsequently published by Chatto & Windus as ''Shadow of a Sun'' (1964; reprinted in 1991 with its originally intended title, ''The Shadow of the Sun'') and ''The Game'' (1967). Byatt took a teaching job in 1972 so as to help pay for the education of her only son. In the same week she accepted, a

drunk driver Drunk driving (or drink-driving in British English) is the act of driving under the influence of alcohol. A small increase in the blood alcohol content increases the relative risk of a motor vehicle crash. In the United States, alcohol is i ...

killed her son as he walked home from school. He was 11 years of age. Byatt spent a symbolic 11 years teaching (the same length of time as her son had lived), then began full-time writing in 1983. '' The Virgin in the Garden'' (1978) was the first of ''The Quartet'', a

tetralogy A tetralogy (from Greek τετρα- '' tetra-'', "four" and -λογία ''-logia'', "discourse") is a compound work that is made up of four distinct works. The name comes from the Attic theater, in which a tetralogy was a group of three tragedie ...

of novels that continued with '' Still Life'' (1985), '' Babel Tower'' (1996) and '' A Whistling Woman'' (2002). Byatt's novel '' Possession: A Romance'' received the 1990 Booker Prize, whilst her short story collection ''

The Djinn in the Nightingale's Eye ''The Djinn in the Nightingale's Eye'' is a 1994 collection of five mythical Short story, short stories by British novelist A. S. Byatt. The collection includes two short stories, "The Glass Coffin" and "Gode's Story" originally published in the ...

'' (1994) received the 1995

Aga Khan Prize for Fiction The Aga Khan Prize for Fiction was awarded by the editors of ''The Paris Review'' for what they deem to be the best short story published in the magazine in a given year. The last prize was given in 2004. No applications were accepted. The winner ...

. Her novel ''

The Children's Book ''The Children's Book'' is a 2009 novel by British writer A. S. Byatt. It follows the adventures of several inter-related families, adults and children, from 1895 through World War I. Loosely based upon the life of children's writer E. Nesbit th ...

'' was shortlisted for the 2009 Booker Prize and won the 2010

James Tait Black Memorial Prize The James Tait Black Memorial Prizes are literary prizes awarded for literature written in the English language. They, along with the Hawthornden Prize, are Britain's oldest literary awards. Based at the University of Edinburgh in Scotland, Uni ...

. Her critical work includes two studies of Dame Iris Murdoch (who was a friend and mentor), ''Degrees of Freedom: The Early Novels of Iris Murdoch'' (1965) and ''Iris Murdoch: A Critical Study'' (1976). Her other critical studies include ''Wordsworth and Coleridge in Their Time'' (1970) and ''Portraits in Fiction'' (2001). Byatt was awarded the

Shakespeare Prize The Shakespeare Prize was an annual prize for writing or performance awarded to a British citizen by the Hamburg Alfred Toepfer Foundation. First given by Alfred Toepfer in 1937 as an expression of his Anglophilia in the face of tense internatio ...

in 2002, the

Erasmus Prize The Erasmus Prize is an annual prize awarded by the board of the Praemium Erasmianum Foundation to individuals or institutions that have made exceptional contributions to culture, society, or social science in Europe and the rest of the world. I ...

in 2016, the

Park Kyong-ni Prize Park Kyong-ni Prize (Korean: 박경리 문학상) is an international literary award based in South Korea. It was established in 2011 in honor of Park Kyung-ni, known for her series '' Toji''. The award was founded and sponsored by the Toji Founda ...

in 2017 and the

Hans Christian Andersen Literature Award The Hans Christian Andersen Literature Award is a Danish literary award established in 2010. It is awarded every other year to a living author whose work resembles Hans Christian Andersen. It is one of the biggest literary prizes in the world wit ...

in 2018. She has been mentioned as a candidate for the Nobel Prize in Literature.

Early life

Byatt was born in

Sheffield Sheffield is a city in South Yorkshire, England, whose name derives from the River Sheaf which runs through it. The city serves as the administrative centre of the City of Sheffield. It is historically part of the West Riding of Yorkshire a ...

as Antonia Susan Drabble, the eldest child of John Drabble, QC, and Kathleen Bloor, a scholar of Browning. Her sisters are the novelist Margaret Drabble and the art historian Helen Langdon. Her brother Richard Drabble KC is a barrister. The Drabble father participated in the placement of Jewish refugees in Sheffield during the 1930s. The mother was a

Shavian The Shavian alphabet (; also known as the Shaw alphabet) is an alphabet conceived as a way to provide simple, phonemic orthography for the English language to replace the difficulties of English orthography, conventional spelling using the E ...

and the father a Quaker. As a result of the bombing of Sheffield during the

Second World War World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposi ...

the family moved to

York York is a cathedral city with Roman origins, sited at the confluence of the rivers Ouse and Foss in North Yorkshire, England. It is the historic county town of Yorkshire. The city has many historic buildings and other structures, such as a ...

. Byatt was educated at two independent boarding schools, Sheffield High School and The Mount School, a Quaker boarding school at York. She noted in an interview in 2009, "I am not a Quaker, of course, because I'm anti-Christian and the Quakers are a form of Christianity but their religion is wonderful — you simply sat in silence and listened to the nature of things." A "deeply unhappy" child, Byatt did not enjoy boarding school, citing her need to be alone and her difficulty in making friends. She attended

Newnham College, Cambridge Newnham College is a women's constituent college of the University of Cambridge. The college was founded in 1871 by a group organising Lectures for Ladies, members of which included philosopher Henry Sidgwick and suffragist campaigner Millicen ...

Bryn Mawr College Bryn Mawr College ( ; Welsh: ) is a women's liberal arts college in Bryn Mawr, Pennsylvania. Founded as a Quaker institution in 1885, Bryn Mawr is one of the Seven Sister colleges, a group of elite, historically women's colleges in the United ...

(in the United States), and Somerville College, Oxford. Having studied French, German, Latin, and English at school, she later studied Italian while attending Cambridge so that she could read

Dante Dante Alighieri (; – 14 September 1321), probably baptized Durante di Alighiero degli Alighieri and often referred to as Dante (, ), was an Italian people, Italian Italian poetry, poet, writer and philosopher. His ''Divine Comedy'', origin ...

. "This means that I can actually read European literature with its own rhythms even if I have to have a side-by-side text for the difficult bits", she said in 1998. Byatt lectured in the Department of Extra-Mural Studies of the

University of London The University of London (UoL; abbreviated as Lond or more rarely Londin in post-nominals) is a federal public research university located in London, England, United Kingdom. The university was established by royal charter in 1836 as a degree ...

(1962–71), the

Central School of Art and Design The Central School of Art and Design was a public school of fine and applied arts in London, England. It offered foundation and degree level courses. It was established in 1896 by the London County Council as the Central School of Arts and ...

and from 1972 to 1983 at

University College London , mottoeng = Let all come who by merit deserve the most reward , established = , type = Public research university , endowment = £143 million (2020) , budget = ...

. She began writing full-time in 1983.

Personal life

Byatt married Ian Charles Rayner Byatt in 1959 and moved to

. They had a daughter together, as well as a son, Charles, who was killed by a drink-driver at the age of 11 whilst walking home from school. She spoke of her son's death and its influence on her lecturing and subsequent career after publishing ''

'', in which the image of a dead child features: Byatt said she wished to become a full-time writer, but "if I had a job we could send my son to a fee-paying school. My son got killed on

Frank Kermode Sir John Frank Kermode, FBA (29 November 1919 – 17 August 2010) was a British literary critic best known for his 1967 work '' The Sense of an Ending: Studies in the Theory of Fiction'' and for his extensive book-reviewing and editing. He was ...

's doorstep, the day I accepted the job more or less — so there was no point in having the job except what else was I going to do". Byatt stayed in the job for "as long as he had lived, which was 11 years", then, she said, "it was like being released from a spell". She came to regard her academic career "very symbolically". She later wrote the poem "Dead Boys". The marriage was dissolved in 1969. Byatt has two daughters with her second husband, Peter Duffy. Byatt's relationship with her sister Margaret Drabble has sometimes been strained due to the presence of autobiographical elements in both their writing. While their relationship is no longer especially close and they do not read each other's books, Drabble describes the situation as "normal sibling rivalry" and Byatt says it has been "terribly overstated by gossip columnists" and that the sisters "always have liked each other on the bottom line." Byatt is an agnostic and a

grandmother Grandparents, individually known as grandmother and grandfather, are the parents of a person's father or mother – paternal or maternal. Every sexually-reproducing living organism who is not a genetic chimera has a maximum of four genetic gra ...

. She is interested in snooker.

Influences

Byatt has been influenced by

Henry James Henry James ( – ) was an American-British author. He is regarded as a key transitional figure between literary realism and literary modernism, and is considered by many to be among the greatest novelists in the English language. He was the ...

and

George Eliot Mary Ann Evans (22 November 1819 – 22 December 1880; alternatively Mary Anne or Marian), known by her pen name George Eliot, was an English novelist, poet, journalist, translator, and one of the leading writers of the Victorian era. She wrot ...

as well as

Emily Dickinson Emily Elizabeth Dickinson (December 10, 1830 – May 15, 1886) was an American poet. Little-known during her life, she has since been regarded as one of the most important figures in American poetry. Dickinson was born in Amherst, Massac ...

, T. S. Eliot,

Coleridge Samuel Taylor Coleridge (; 21 October 177225 July 1834) was an English poet, literary critic, philosopher, and theologian who, with his friend William Wordsworth, was a founder of the Romantic Movement in England and a member of the Lake ...

Tennyson Alfred Tennyson, 1st Baron Tennyson (6 August 1809 – 6 October 1892) was an English poet. He was the Poet Laureate during much of Queen Victoria's reign. In 1829, Tennyson was awarded the Chancellor's Gold Medal at Cambridge for one of his ...

and Robert Browning, in merging

realism Realism, Realistic, or Realists may refer to: In the arts *Realism (arts), the general attempt to depict subjects truthfully in different forms of the arts Arts movements related to realism include: *Classical Realism *Literary realism, a move ...

and naturalism with

fantasy Fantasy is a genre of speculative fiction involving magical elements, typically set in a fictional universe and sometimes inspired by mythology and folklore. Its roots are in oral traditions, which then became fantasy literature and d ...

. She is not an admirer of the

Brontë family The Brontës () were a nineteenth-century literary family, born in the village of Thornton and later associated with the village of Haworth in the West Riding of Yorkshire, England. The sisters, Charlotte (1816–1855), Emily (1818–184 ...

, admitting to finding their "joint imagination absolutely appalling". Nor does she like

Christina Rossetti Christina Georgina Rossetti (5 December 1830 – 29 December 1894) was an English writer of romantic, devotional and children's poems, including " Goblin Market" and "Remember". She also wrote the words of two Christmas carols well known in Bri ...

. She is ambivalent about

D. H. Lawrence David Herbert Lawrence (11 September 1885 – 2 March 1930) was an English writer, novelist, poet and essayist. His works reflect on modernity, industrialization, sexuality, emotional health, vitality, spontaneity and instinct. His best-k ...

and also stated: "I don't like the English gentlemanly high-church sort of refined person, except for

George Herbert George Herbert (3 April 1593 – 1 March 1633) was an English poet, orator, and priest of the Church of England. His poetry is associated with the writings of the metaphysical poets, and he is recognised as "one of the foremost British devoti ...

, who is perfect and unexpected". She had learnt Jane Austen off before her teens. In her books, Byatt alludes to, and builds upon, themes from Romantic and

Victorian literature Victorian literature refers to English literature during the reign of Queen Victoria (1837–1901). The 19th century is considered by some to be the Golden Age of English Literature, especially for British novels. It was in the Victorian era tha ...

. She cited art historian

John Gage John Burdette Gage (born October 9, 1942) was the 21st employee of Sun Microsystems, where he is credited with creating the phrase The Network is the Computer. He served as vice president and chief researcher and director of the Science Office ...

's book on the theory of colour as one of her favourite books to reread.

she regarded as "writing criticism about a literature that one might hope to add things to. In a way, what Kermode said

William Golding Sir William Gerald Golding (19 September 1911 – 19 June 1993) was a British novelist, playwright, and poet. Best known for his debut novel ''Lord of the Flies'' (1954), he published another twelve volumes of fiction in his lifetime. In 1980 ...

and

Lawrence Durrell Lawrence George Durrell (; 27 February 1912 – 7 November 1990) was an expatriate British novelist, poet, dramatist, and travel writer. He was the eldest brother of naturalist and writer Gerald Durrell. Born in India to British colonial p ...

were doing was more important to me than what Golding or Durrell ''were'' doing", Byatt said in her interview for ''

The Paris Review ''The Paris Review'' is a quarterly English-language literary magazine established in Paris in 1953 by Harold L. Humes, Peter Matthiessen, and George Plimpton. In its first five years, ''The Paris Review'' published works by Jack Kerouac, Phil ...

s "The Art of Fiction" series.

Writing

Fiction

Byatt wrote a lot whilst attending boarding school but had most of it burnt before she left. She began writing her first novel whilst at the

, where she did not attend many lectures but when she did passed the time attempting to write a novel, which — given her limited experience of life — involved a young woman at university trying to write a novel, a novel, her novel, which — she knew — was "no good". She left it in a drawer when she was done. After departing Cambridge, she spent one year as a postgraduate student in the United States and there began her second novel, ''The Game'', continuing to write it at Oxford when she returned to England. After getting married in 1959 and moving to

, she left ''The Game'' aside and resumed work on her earlier novel. She sent it to literary critic

John Beer John Bernard Beer, FBA (31 March 1926 – 10 December 2017) was a British literary critic. He was emeritus professor of English literature at the University of Cambridge and a fellow of Peterhouse, Cambridge. Best known as a scholar and criti ...

, whom she had befriended whilst at Cambridge and, she later said, "whose ideas, I think, run through almost everything I write". Beer sent Byatt's novel to the independent book publishing company Chatto & Windus. From there Cecil Day-Lewis wrote her a response and invited her to lunch at The Athenaeum, where he shared his thoughts on "poetry and

Yeats William Butler Yeats (13 June 186528 January 1939) was an Irish poet, dramatist, writer and one of the foremost figures of 20th-century literature. He was a driving force behind the Irish Literary Revival and became a pillar of the Irish liter ...

and Auden and

Shakespeare William Shakespeare ( 26 April 1564 – 23 April 1616) was an English playwright, poet and actor. He is widely regarded as the greatest writer in the English language and the world's pre-eminent dramatist. He is often called England's natio ...

, and it was the literary conversation I had never had. When we got out on the pavement I rather tremblingly said, Might you be thinking of publishing this novel? He said, Oh yes, of course, of course". Day-Lewis was Byatt's first editor; D. J. Enright would succeed him. ''Shadow of a Sun'', Byatt's first novel, is about a girl and her father and was published in 1964. It was reprinted in 1991 with its originally intended title, ''The Shadow of the Sun'', intact. ''The Game'', published in 1967, concerned the dynamics between two sisters. The reception for Byatt's first books became confused with her sister's writing, as well as her sister's quicker rate of publication. The family theme is continued in ''The Quartet'', Byatt's

of novels, which begins with '' The Virgin in the Garden'' (1978) and continues with '' Still Life'' (1985), '' Babel Tower'' (1996) and '' A Whistling Woman'' (2002). Her quartet is inspired by

, particularly ''

The Rainbow ''The Rainbow'' is a novel by British author D. H. Lawrence, first published by Methuen & Co. in 1915. It follows three generations of the Brangwen family living in Nottinghamshire, focusing particularly on the individual's struggle to growth ...

'' and ''

Women in Love ''Women in Love'' (1920) is a novel by English author D. H. Lawrence. It is a sequel to his earlier novel ''The Rainbow'' (1915) and follows the continuing loves and lives of the Brangwen sisters, Gudrun and Ursula. Gudrun Brangwen, an artist, ...

''. The family portrayed in the quartet are from

Yorkshire Yorkshire ( ; abbreviated Yorks), formally known as the County of York, is a historic county in northern England and by far the largest in the United Kingdom. Because of its large area in comparison with other English counties, functions have ...

. Byatt said the idea for ''The Virgin in the Garden'' came in part from an class she taught in which she had read

Tolstoy Count Lev Nikolayevich TolstoyTolstoy pronounced his first name as , which corresponds to the romanization ''Lyov''. () (; russian: link=no, Лев Николаевич Толстой,In Tolstoy's day, his name was written as in pre-refor ...

and Dostoevsky and in part from her time living in Durham in 1961, the year in which her son was born. The book was an attempt to understand what could be achieved if ''

Middlemarch ''Middlemarch, A Study of Provincial Life'' is a novel by the English author Mary Anne Evans, who wrote as George Eliot. It first appeared in eight installments (volumes) in 1871 and 1872. Set in Middlemarch, a fictional English Midland town, ...

'' were written in the middle of the twentieth century. Byatt's book features a powerful death scene, which she invented in 1961 (inspired by Byatt's reading of

Angus Wilson Sir Angus Frank Johnstone-Wilson, CBE (11 August 191331 May 1991) was an English novelist and short story writer. He was one of England's first openly gay authors. He was awarded the 1958 James Tait Black Memorial Prize for '' The Middle Age of ...

's book '' The Middle Age of Mrs Eliot'' and the accident in its opening), a death scene which has drawn complaints from numerous readers for its vividness. Describing mid-20th-century Britain, the books follow the life of Frederica Potter, a young intellectual studying at Cambridge at a time when women were heavily outnumbered by men at that university, and then tracing her journey as a divorcée with a young son as he makes a new life for herself in London. Byatt says some of the characters in her fiction represent her "greatest terror which is simple domesticity... I had this image of coming out from under and seeing the light for a bit and then being shut in a kitchen, which I think happened to women of my generation." Like ''Babel Tower'', ''A Whistling Woman'' touches on the

utopia A utopia ( ) typically describes an imaginary community or society that possesses highly desirable or nearly perfect qualities for its members. It was coined by Sir Thomas More for his 1516 book '' Utopia'', describing a fictional island societ ...

n and revolutionary dreams of the 1960s. Byatt described herself as "a naturally pessimistic animal": "I don't believe that human beings are basically good, so I think all utopian movements are doomed to fail, but I am interested in them." Also an accomplished

short story A short story is a piece of prose fiction that typically can be read in one sitting and focuses on a self-contained incident or series of linked incidents, with the intent of evoking a single effect or mood. The short story is one of the oldest ...

writer, Byatt's first published collection was ''Sugar and Other Stories'' (1987). ''The Matisse Stories'' (1993) features three pieces, each describing a painting by the eponymous painter, each the tale of an initially smaller crisis that shows the long-present unravelling in the protagonists' lives. ''

'', published in 1994, is a collection of fairy tales. Byatt's other short story collections are ''Elementals: Stories of Fire and Ice'', published in 1998, and ''Little Black Book of Stories'', published in 2003. Her books reflect a continuous interest in

zoology Zoology ()The pronunciation of zoology as is usually regarded as nonstandard, though it is not uncommon. is the branch of biology that studies the animal kingdom, including the structure, embryology, evolution, classification, habits, and ...

, entomology,

geology Geology () is a branch of natural science concerned with Earth and other astronomical objects, the features or rocks of which it is composed, and the processes by which they change over time. Modern geology significantly overlaps all other Ea ...

, and Darwinism among other repeated themes. She is also interested in

linguistics Linguistics is the science, scientific study of human language. It is called a scientific study because it entails a comprehensive, systematic, objective, and precise analysis of all aspects of language, particularly its nature and structure ...

and takes a keen interest in the translation of her books. Byatt said: "I can't say how important it was to me when

Angela Carter Angela Olive Pearce (formerly Carter, Stalker; 7 May 1940 – 16 February 1992), who published under the name Angela Carter, was an English novelist, short story writer, poet, and journalist, known for her feminist, magical realism, and picar ...

said 'I grew up on fairy stories — they're much more important to me than realist narratives'. I hadn't had the nerve to think that until she said it, and I owe her a great deal". Carter, in an earlier (first) meeting with Byatt after a

Stevie Smith Florence Margaret Smith, known as Stevie Smith (20 September 1902 – 7 March 1971), was an English poet and novelist. She won the Cholmondeley Award and was awarded the Queen's Gold Medal for Poetry. A play, '' Stevie'' by Hugh Whitemore, ba ...

poetry reading, had dismissed Byatt's work, so this change of heart vindicated Byatt's approach to writing and Byatt readily acknowledged it. '' Possession'' (1990) parallels the emerging relationship of two contemporary academics with the lives of two (fictional) 19th-century poets whom they are researching. It won the 1990 Booker Prize and was adapted for a film released in 2002. Byatt's novella '' Morpho Eugenia'' was included in ''Angels & Insects'' (1992), which was turned into the eponymous 1995 film; that film received an Academy Award for Best Costume Design nomination in 1997. Byatt's novel '' The Biographer's Tale'', published in 2000, she originally intended as a short story titled "The Biography of a Biographer", based on her notion of a biographer's life in a library investigating another person's life. This she developed into writing about a character called Phineas G. Nanson, who is attempting to learn about a biographer for a book he intends to write but who can only locate fragments of his three unwritten biographies instead: on

Galton Sir Francis Galton, FRS FRAI (; 16 February 1822 – 17 January 1911), was an English Victorian era polymath: a statistician, sociologist, psychologist, anthropologist, tropical explorer, geographer, inventor, meteorologist, proto- ...

, Ibsen and

Linnaeus Carl Linnaeus (; 23 May 1707 – 10 January 1778), also known after his ennoblement in 1761 as Carl von Linné Blunt (2004), p. 171. (), was a Swedish botanist, zoologist, taxonomist, and physician who formalised binomial nomenclature, the ...

. Phineas Gilbert Nanson (to give him his full name) is called after an insect and is a near anagram of Galton, Ibsen and Linnaeus, though Byatt said this was an "uncanny" coincidence which she did not realise until afterwards. ''

'', published in 2009, is a novel spanning from 1895 until the end of the

First World War World War I (28 July 1914 11 November 1918), often abbreviated as WWI, was one of the deadliest global conflicts in history. Belligerents included much of Europe, the Russian Empire, the United States, and the Ottoman Empire, with fightin ...

and centring on the fictional writer Olive Wellwood. She is based upon

E. Nesbit Edith Nesbit (married name Edith Bland; 15 August 1858 – 4 May 1924) was an English writer and poet, who published her books for children as E. Nesbit. She wrote or collaborated on more than 60 such books. She was also a political activist a ...

. Another character — Herbert Methley — is a combination of

H. G. Wells Herbert George Wells"Wells, H. G."
Revised 18 May 2015. ''

, according to Byatt. The novel also features Rupert Brooke, Emma Goldman, Auguste Rodin,

George Bernard Shaw George Bernard Shaw (26 July 1856 – 2 November 1950), known at his insistence simply as Bernard Shaw, was an Irish playwright, critic, polemicist and political activist. His influence on Western theatre, culture and politics extended from ...

Virginia Woolf Adeline Virginia Woolf (; ; 25 January 1882 28 March 1941) was an English writer, considered one of the most important modernist 20th-century authors and a pioneer in the use of stream of consciousness as a narrative device. Woolf was born i ...

and Oscar Wilde, all appearing as themselves. Byatt initially intended to title the book as ''The Hedgehog, the White Goose and the Mad March Hare''. Byatt said in 2009: "I think of writing simply in terms of pleasure. It's the most important thing in my life, making things. Much as I love my husband and my children, I love them only because I am the person who makes these things. I, who I am, is the person that has the project of making a thing. Well, that's putting it pompously — but constructing. I do see it in sort of three-dimensional structures. And because that person does that all the time, that person is able to love all these people." Her preference for "making things" is also present in a 2003 interview, when she said: "I don't like to talk about

creative writing Creative writing is any writing that goes outside the bounds of normal professional, journalistic, academic, or technical forms of literature, typically identified by an emphasis on narrative craft, character development, and the use of literary ...

, which is a

vestigial Vestigiality is the retention, during the process of evolution, of genetically determined structures or attributes that have lost some or all of the ancestral function in a given species. Assessment of the vestigiality must generally rely on co ...

religious

tic A tic is a sudden, repetitive, nonrhythmic motor movement or vocalization involving discrete muscle groups.American Psychiatric Association (2000)DSM-IV-TR: Tourette's Disorder.''Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders'', 4th ed., ...

in me. If anything is created, God does it. I don't. I make things--making is a nice word". She writes at her home in

West London West London is the western part of London, England, north of the River Thames, west of the City of London, and extending to the Greater London boundary. The term is used to differentiate the area from the other parts of London: North Londo ...

and at another house in the

Cévennes The Cévennes ( , ; oc, Cevenas) is a cultural region and range of mountains in south-central France, on the south-east edge of the Massif Central. It covers parts of the ''départements'' of Ardèche, Gard, Hérault and Lozère. Rich in geogra ...

in Southern France, where she spends her summers. She does not write her fiction on a computer, she does so by hand, though she has deployed a computer for non-fiction articles. According to a 1991 unpublished interview with the '' Los Angeles Times Book Review'', Byatt said she began her writing day at around 10 a.m., prompting herself by reading something easy and then something harder: "And then after a bit if I read something difficult that's really interesting I get this itch to start writing. So what I like to do is to write from about half past twelve, one, through to about four". At this point, she said, she began reading again.

Criticism

Byatt wrote two critical studies of Dame Iris Murdoch, who was a friend, mentor and another significant influence on her own writing. They were titled ''Degrees of Freedom: The Early Novels of Iris Murdoch'' (1965) and ''Iris Murdoch: A Critical Study'' (1976). " cause I actually didn't want a mentor I found the friendship very difficult to handle... she simply used you as material", Byatt said. "She loved you very much but she would take you out to lunch and just fire questions at you like a clay pigeon shoot". Byatt also described Murdoch's husband John Bayley's decision to publish a

memoir A memoir (; , ) is any nonfiction narrative writing based in the author's personal memories. The assertions made in the work are thus understood to be factual. While memoir has historically been defined as a subcategory of biography or autobiog ...

of his time with her as "wicked" and "unforgivable", saying: "I knew her enough to know that she would have hated it... it's had a horrible effect on how people feel about her and see her and think about her... Feelings were in her work but it wasn't restricted to feelings. There was thought in it. There was structure in it. An intelligent, complicated world." Byatt's other critical studies include ''Wordsworth and Coleridge in Their Time'' (1970). 2001's ''Portraits in Fiction'' is about painting in novels, and features references to

Emile Zola Emil or Emile may refer to: Literature *'' Emile, or On Education'' (1762), a treatise on education by Jean-Jacques Rousseau * ''Émile'' (novel) (1827), an autobiographical novel based on Émile de Girardin's early life *'' Emil and the Detecti ...

, Marcel Proust and Iris Murdoch; Byatt had earlier touched upon this subject in a 2000 lecture she delivered at the National Portrait Gallery in London. She had no time for the so-called "

angry young men The "angry young men" were a group of mostly working- and middle-class British playwrights and novelists who became prominent in the 1950s. The group's leading figures included John Osborne and Kingsley Amis; other popular figures included Jo ...

", e.g. John Osborne and

Kingsley Amis Sir Kingsley William Amis (16 April 1922 – 22 October 1995) was an English novelist, poet, critic, and teacher. He wrote more than 20 novels, six volumes of poetry, a memoir, short stories, radio and television scripts, and works of social a ...

, and had little more time for

Evelyn Waugh Arthur Evelyn St. John Waugh (; 28 October 1903 – 10 April 1966) was an English writer of novels, biographies, and travel books; he was also a prolific journalist and book reviewer. His most famous works include the early satires '' Decl ...

(though she considers him a superior artist to Amis), and, whilst she initially mistook

Anthony Burgess John Anthony Burgess Wilson, (; 25 February 1917 – 22 November 1993), who published under the name Anthony Burgess, was an English writer and composer. Although Burgess was primarily a comic writer, his dystopian satire ''A Clockwork ...

for "another angry young man", she later realised her error and admitted he was "full of rich invention and a complete lack of narrowness".

Georgette Heyer Georgette Heyer (; 16 August 1902 – 4 July 1974) was an English novelist and short-story writer, in both the Regency romance and detective fiction genres. Her writing career began in 1921, when she turned a story for her younger brother ...

's books she finds "deeply moving". Byatt has been a public encourager of the new young generation of British writers, including

Philip Hensher Philip Michael Hensher FRSL (born 20 February 1965) is an English novelist, critic and journalist. Biography Son of Raymond J. and Miriam Hensher, his father a bank manager and composer and his mother a university librarian, Hensher was born in ...

(''Kitchen Venom''), Robert Irwin (''Exquisite Corpse''), A. L. Kennedy,

Lawrence Norfolk Lawrence Norfolk (born 1963) is a British novelist known for historical works with complex plots and intricate detail. Biography Though born in London, Norfolk lived in Iraq until 1967 and then in the West Country of England. He read Engli ...

, David Mitchell (''

Ghostwritten ''Ghostwritten'' is the first novel published by English author David Mitchell. Published in 1999, it won the John Llewellyn Rhys Prize and was widely acclaimed. The story takes place mainly around East Asia, but also moves through Russia, B ...

''),

Ali Smith Ali Smith CBE FRSL (born 24 August 1962) is a Scottish author, playwright, academic and journalist. Sebastian Barry described her in 2016 as "Scotland's Nobel laureate-in-waiting". Early life and education Smith was born in Inverness on 24 ...

(''

Hotel World ''Hotel World'' is a postmodern novel, influenced by modernist novels, written by Ali Smith. The novel portrays the stages of grief in relation to the passage of time. It won both the Scottish Arts Council Book Award (2001) and the Encore A ...

''),

Zadie Smith Zadie Smith FRSL (born Sadie; 25 October 1975) is an English novelist, essayist, and short-story writer. Her debut novel, ''White Teeth'' (2000), immediately became a best-seller and won a number of awards. She has been a tenured professor ...

(''

White Teeth ''White Teeth'' is a 2000 novel by the British author Zadie Smith. It focuses on the later lives of two wartime friends—the Bangladeshi Samad Iqbal and the Englishman Archie Jones—and their families in London. The novel centres on Britain' ...

'') and Adam Thirlwell, saying in 2009 that she was "not entirely disinterested, because I wish there to be a literary world in which people are not writing books only about people's feelings... all the ones I like write also about ideas". She contrasted some of those preferences with the work of Martin Amis,

Julian Barnes Julian Patrick Barnes (born 19 January 1946) is an English writer. He won the Man Booker Prize in 2011 with '' The Sense of an Ending'', having been shortlisted three times previously with '' Flaubert's Parrot'', ''England, England'', and '' A ...

Ian McEwan Ian Russell McEwan, (born 21 June 1948) is an English novelist and screenwriter. In 2008, ''The Times'' featured him on its list of "The 50 greatest British writers since 1945" and ''The Daily Telegraph'' ranked him number 19 in its list of th ...

and Graham Swift — then added, "In fact I admire all four of those writers... they don't only do people's feelings... nevertheless it's become ossified". Norfolk she described in 2003 as "the best of the young novelists now writing". She also spoke of her admiration for American writer

Helen DeWitt Helen DeWitt (born 1957 in Takoma Park, Maryland) is an American novelist. She is the author of the novels ''The Last Samurai'' (2000) and ''Lightning Rods'' (2011) and the short story collection ''Some Trick'' (2018) and, in collaboration with t ...

's book ''

The Last Samurai ''The Last Samurai'' is a 2003 epic period action drama film directed and co-produced by Edward Zwick, who also co-wrote the screenplay with John Logan and Marshall Herskovitz from a story devised by Logan. The film stars Ken Watanabe in the ...

''. Hensher, who counts Byatt as a friend, said: "She's very unusual for an English person, in that she's quite suspicious of comedy. With most people, sooner or later, every intellectual position comes down to a joke — it never does with her. This is where I think she fights with Kingsley Amis". Questioned about whether her writing was "

gender Gender is the range of characteristics pertaining to femininity and masculinity and differentiating between them. Depending on the context, this may include sex-based social structures (i.e. gender roles) and gender identity. Most cultures ...

ed", Byatt responded:

"I've played with trying to understand what the word means, but use either "
sex Sex is the trait that determines whether a sexually reproducing animal or plant produces male or female gametes. Male plants and animals produce smaller mobile gametes (spermatozoa, sperm, pollen), while females produce larger ones ( ova, of ...
" or "men and women" instead, partly because the word gendered has caused a great many of my friends to write work that is bordering on not saying anything. I have always had a romantic idea that the writer or the artist was, as
Coleridge Samuel Taylor Coleridge (; 21 October 177225 July 1834) was an English poet, literary critic, philosopher, and theologian who, with his friend William Wordsworth, was a founder of the Romantic Movement in England and a member of the Lake ...
and
Virginia Woolf Adeline Virginia Woolf (; ; 25 January 1882 28 March 1941) was an English writer, considered one of the most important modernist 20th-century authors and a pioneer in the use of stream of consciousness as a narrative device. Woolf was born i ...
said, androgynous. The whole of '' The Virgin in the Garden'' quartet is about the desirability of an androgynous mind. I am too old for the women's movement in America or this country. I was fighting battles for the freedom of women, all by myself as I saw it, in the Fifties. I was partly amazed by the organised fight and partly appalled, because freedoms it had been hard for us to win--to be taken seriously by men as equal people to talk to--were suddenly thrown away by the idea that women should band together and talk to each other about each other, about women, and have
Women's Studies Women's studies is an academic field that draws on feminist and interdisciplinary methods to place women's lives and experiences at the center of study, while examining social and cultural constructs of gender; systems of privilege and oppress ...
in women's buildings. I learnt never to write a list of my favourite painters or writers without women in, but equally I would never write one without men in. I don't think you can live in the world i
the battle between the sexes
is more important than communication between the sexes. It never was, to me--I like men. My father was one of the most important presences in my life and he was rational and sane and liked women".

Byatt has been a judge on many literary award panels, including the Betty Trask Award, the

David Higham Prize for Fiction The David Higham Prize for Fiction was inaugurated in 1975 to mark the 80th birthday of David Higham, literary agent, and was awarded annually to a citizen of the Commonwealth, Republic of Ireland, Pakistan, or South Africa for a first novel or boo ...

, the

Hawthornden Prize The Hawthornden Prize is a British literary award that was established in 1919 by Alice Warrender, who was born at Hawthornden Castle. Authors under the age of 41 are awarded on the quality of their "imaginative literature", which can be written ...

and the Booker. She has also written for media, including for ''

The Times Literary Supplement ''The Times Literary Supplement'' (''TLS'') is a weekly literary review published in London by News UK, a subsidiary of News Corp. History The ''TLS'' first appeared in 1902 as a supplement to ''The Times'' but became a separate publication ...

'', British journal '' Prospect'' and newspapers ''

The Guardian ''The Guardian'' is a British daily newspaper. It was founded in 1821 as ''The Manchester Guardian'', and changed its name in 1959. Along with its sister papers ''The Observer'' and ''The Guardian Weekly'', ''The Guardian'' is part of the Gu ...

'', ''

The Independent ''The Independent'' is a British online newspaper. It was established in 1986 as a national morning printed paper. Nicknamed the ''Indy'', it began as a broadsheet and changed to tabloid format in 2003. The last printed edition was publish ...

'' and ''

The Sunday Times ''The Sunday Times'' is a British newspaper whose circulation makes it the largest in Britain's quality press market category. It was founded in 1821 as ''The New Observer''. It is published by Times Newspapers Ltd, a subsidiary of News UK, w ...

''.

Awards and honours

Byatt was appointed

Commander of the Order of the British Empire The Most Excellent Order of the British Empire is a British order of chivalry, rewarding contributions to the arts and sciences, work with charitable and welfare organisations, and public service outside the civil service. It was established ...

(CBE) in the 1990 New Year Honours, and was promoted to Dame Commander of the Order of the British Empire (DBE), "for services to Literature", in

Elizabeth II Elizabeth II (Elizabeth Alexandra Mary; 21 April 1926 – 8 September 2022) was Queen of the United Kingdom and other Commonwealth realms from 6 February 1952 until her death in 2022. She was queen regnant of 32 sovereign states during ...

's 1999 Birthday Honours. She has been mentioned as a candidate for the Nobel Prize in Literature. In 2008, ''

The Times ''The Times'' is a British daily national newspaper based in London. It began in 1785 under the title ''The Daily Universal Register'', adopting its current name on 1 January 1788. ''The Times'' and its sister paper '' The Sunday Times'' (f ...

'' named her on its list of the 50 greatest British writers since 1945. *1986: PEN/Macmillan Silver Pen Award, for ''Still Life'' *1990:

Booker Prize for Fiction The Booker Prize, formerly known as the Booker Prize for Fiction (1969–2001) and the Man Booker Prize (2002–2019), is a literary prize awarded each year for the best novel written in English and published in the United Kingdom or Ireland. ...

, for ''Possession: A Romance'' *1990: ''

The Irish Times ''The Irish Times'' is an Irish daily broadsheet newspaper and online digital publication. It launched on 29 March 1859. The editor is Ruadhán Mac Cormaic. It is published every day except Sundays. ''The Irish Times'' is considered a newspaper ...

'' International Fiction Prize, for ''Possession: A Romance'' *1991:

Commonwealth Writers Prize Commonwealth Foundation presented a number of prizes between 1987 and 2011. The main award was called the Commonwealth Writers' Prize and was composed of two prizes: the Best Book Prize (overall and regional) was awarded from 1987 to 2011; the Best ...

(Eurasia Region, Best Book), for ''Possession: A Romance'' *1991: Honorary

DLitt Doctor of Letters (D.Litt., Litt.D., Latin: ' or ') is a terminal degree in the humanities that, depending on the country, is a higher doctorate after the Doctor of Philosophy (Ph.D.) degree or equivalent to a higher doctorate, such as the Doctor ...

from the

University of Durham Durham University (legally the University of Durham) is a collegiate university, collegiate public university, public research university in Durham, England, Durham, England, founded by an Act of Parliament in 1832 and incorporated by royal charte ...

*1993: Honorary LittD from the

University of Liverpool , mottoeng = These days of peace foster learning , established = 1881 – University College Liverpool1884 – affiliated to the federal Victoria Universityhttp://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukla/2004/4 University of Manchester Act 200 ...

*1994: Honorary Doctorate from the University of Portsmouth *1995: Honorary Doctorate from the

*1995: Premio Malaparte (Italy) *1995:

, for ''The Djinn in the Nightingale's Eye'' *1998: Mythopoeic Fantasy Award for Adult Literature, for ''The Djinn in the Nightingale's Eye'' *1999: Honorary DLitt from the

*1999: Honorary Fellow,

*2002:

(Germany) *2004: Honorary

Doctor of Letters Doctor of Letters (D.Litt., Litt.D., Latin: ' or ') is a terminal degree in the humanities that, depending on the country, is a higher doctorate after the Doctor of Philosophy (Ph.D.) degree or equivalent to a higher doctorate, such as the Docto ...

from the

University of Kent , motto_lang = , mottoeng = Literal translation: 'Whom to serve is to reign'(Book of Common Prayer translation: 'whose service is perfect freedom')Graham Martin, ''From Vision to Reality: the Making of the University of Kent at Canterbury'' ...

*2004: Honorary Fellow,

University College London , mottoeng = Let all come who by merit deserve the most reward , established = , type = Public research university , endowment = £143 million (2020) , budget = ...

*2009:

Blue Metropolis Blue Metropolis (also known as Blue Met) is an international literary festival held annually in Montreal since 1999. Founded by Montreal writer Linda Leith, it is one of the world's first multilingual literary festival. In early 2011, Leith depar ...

International Literary Grand Prix (Canada) *2009: Booker Prize shortlist, for ''The Children's Book'' *2010: Honorary doctorate from Leiden University (Netherlands) *2010:

, for ''The Children's Book'' *2016:

(Netherlands), for "exceptional contribution to literature" *2017: Fellow of the British Academy of the

British Academy The British Academy is the United Kingdom's national academy for the humanities and the social sciences. It was established in 1902 and received its royal charter in the same year. It is now a fellowship of more than 1,000 leading scholars spa ...

*2017:

(South Korea) *2017: Golden Plate Award of the

American Academy of Achievement The American Academy of Achievement, colloquially known as the Academy of Achievement, is a non-profit educational organization that recognizes some of the highest achieving individuals in diverse fields and gives them the opportunity to meet ...

*2018:

(Denmark)

Memberships

* 1987–1988: Kingman Committee of Inquiry into the teaching of English Language, (Department of Education and Science) * 1984–1988: Management Committee,

Society of Authors The Society of Authors (SoA) is a United Kingdom trade union for professional writers, illustrators and literary translators, founded in 1884 to protect the rights and further the interests of authors. , it represents over 12,000 members and ass ...

(Deputy chairman, 1986, Chairman, 1986–1988) * 1993–1998: Board,

British Council The British Council is a British organisation specialising in international cultural and educational opportunities. It works in over 100 countries: promoting a wider knowledge of the United Kingdom and the English language (and the Welsh lan ...

(Member of Literature Advisory Panel, 1990–1998) * 2014:

American Academy of Arts and Sciences The American Academy of Arts and Sciences (abbreviation: AAA&S) is one of the oldest learned societies in the United States. It was founded in 1780 during the American Revolution by John Adams, John Hancock, James Bowdoin, Andrew Oliver, a ...

, Foreign Honorary Member

Works

Novels

The following books form a

known as ''The Quartet'': '' The Virgin in the Garden'' (1978), '' Still Life'' (1985), '' Babel Tower'' (1996) and '' A Whistling Woman'' (2002). * 1964 – ''Shadow of a Sun'', Chatto & Windus reprinted in 1991 with originally intended title ''The Shadow of the Sun'' * 1967 – ''The Game'', Chatto & Windus * 1978 – '' The Virgin in the Garden'', Chatto & Windus * 1985 – '' Still Life'', Chatto & Windus * 1990 – '' Possession: A Romance'', Chatto & Windus * 1996 – '' Babel Tower'', Chatto & Windus * 2000 – '' The Biographer's Tale'', Chatto & Windus * 2002 – '' A Whistling Woman'', Chatto & Windus * 2009 – ''

'', Chatto & Windus * 2011 – ''Ragnarok: The End of the Gods'', Canongate

Short story collections

* 1987 – ''Sugar and Other Stories'', Chatto & Windus * 1993 – ''The Matisse Stories'', Chatto & Windus * 1994 – ''

'', Chatto & Windus * 1998 – ''Elementals: Stories of Fire and Ice'', Chatto & Windus * 2003 – ''Little Black Book of Stories'', Chatto & Windus

Novellas

* 1992 – ''Angels and Insects'', Chatto & Windus; comprises a pair of novellas: ** '' Morpho Eugenia'' ** ''The Conjugial Angel''

Essays and biographies

* 1965 – ''Degrees of Freedom: The Early Novels of Iris Murdoch'', Chatto & Windus * 1970 – ''Wordsworth and Coleridge in their Time'',

Nelson Nelson may refer to: Arts and entertainment * ''Nelson'' (1918 film), a historical film directed by Maurice Elvey * ''Nelson'' (1926 film), a historical film directed by Walter Summers * ''Nelson'' (opera), an opera by Lennox Berkeley to a lib ...

* 1976 – ''Iris Murdoch: A Critical Study'',

Longman Longman, also known as Pearson Longman, is a publishing company founded in London, England, in 1724 and is owned by Pearson PLC. Since 1968, Longman has been used primarily as an imprint by Pearson's Schools business. The Longman brand is also ...

* 1989 – ''Unruly Times: Wordsworth and Coleridge, Poetry and Life'',

Hogarth Press The Hogarth Press is a book publishing imprint of Penguin Random House that was founded as an independent company in 1917 by British authors Leonard Woolf and Virginia Woolf. It was named after their house in Richmond (then in Surrey and n ...

* 1991 – ''Passions of the Mind: Selected Writings'', Chatto & Windus * 1995 – ''Imagining Characters: Six Conversations about Women Writers'' (with Ignes Sodre), Chatto & Windus * 2000 – ''On Histories and Stories: Selected Essays'', Chatto & Windus * 2001 – ''Portraits in Fiction'', Chatto & Windus * 2016 – ''Peacock & Vine: On William Morris and Mariano Fortuny'',

Knopf Alfred A. Knopf, Inc. () is an American publishing house that was founded by Alfred A. Knopf Sr. and Blanche Knopf in 1915. Blanche and Alfred traveled abroad regularly and were known for publishing European, Asian, and Latin American writers in ...

Texts edited

* 1989 – ''George Eliot: Selected Essays, Poems and Other Writings'' (editor with Nicholas Warren), Penguin * 1995 – ''New Writing Volume 4'' (editor with

Alan Hollinghurst Alan James Hollinghurst (born 26 May 1954) is an English novelist, poet, short story writer and translator. He won the 1989 Somerset Maugham Award, the 1994 James Tait Black Memorial Prize and the 2004 Booker Prize. Early life and education H ...

Vintage Vintage, in winemaking, is the process of picking grapes and creating the finished product—wine (see Harvest (wine)). A vintage wine is one made from grapes that were all, or primarily, grown and harvested in a single specified year. In certa ...

* 1997 – ''New Writing Volume 6'' (editor with Peter Porter), Vintage * 1998 – ''Oxford Book of English Short Stories'' (editor),

Oxford University Press Oxford University Press (OUP) is the university press of the University of Oxford. It is the largest university press in the world, and its printing history dates back to the 1480s. Having been officially granted the legal right to print books ...

* 2001 – ''The Bird Hand Book'' (with photographs by Victor Schrager), Graphis Inc. (New York)

References

External links

* * * * * * ;Audio interviews and readings * * * Download: * * {{DEFAULTSORT:Byatt, A. S. 1936 births Living people Academics of University College London Academics of the Central School of Art and Design Alumni of Newnham College, Cambridge Alumni of Somerville College, Oxford Booker Prize winners British women short story writers Bryn Mawr College alumni Dames Commander of the Order of the British Empire English agnostics English women novelists English short story writers Fellows of Newnham College, Cambridge Fellows of the Royal Society of Literature Fellows of Somerville College, Oxford Honorary Fellows of the British Academy James Tait Black Memorial Prize recipients O. Henry Award winners People educated at Sheffield High School, South Yorkshire People educated at The Mount School, York Pseudonymous women writers The Guardian people The Independent people The Sunday Times people 20th-century British short story writers 20th-century English novelists 20th-century English women writers 20th-century pseudonymous writers 21st-century British short story writers 21st-century English novelists 21st-century English women writers 21st-century pseudonymous writers Writers from Sheffield