Kathleen Elsie "Kay" Dick (29 July 1915 – 19 October 2001) was an English journalist, writer, novelist and autobiographer, who sometimes wrote under the name Edward Lane De-la-Noy, Michael (24 October 2001)
"Kay Dick"
(obituary), ''

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 ...

''. and Jeremy Scott. She was called "the first woman director in English publishing" and she is celebated for her dystopian "lost" novel, ''They''.

Life

Dick was born Kathleen Elsie at

Queen Charlotte's Hospital Queen Charlotte's and Chelsea Hospital is one of the oldest maternity hospitals in Europe, founded in 1739 in London. Until October 2000, it occupied a site at 339–351 Goldhawk Road, Hammersmith, but is now located between East Acton and White ...

London London is the capital and largest city of England and the United Kingdom, with a population of just under 9 million. It stands on the River Thames in south-east England at the head of a estuary down to the North Sea, and has been a majo ...

; her father was never known. She was raised in Switzerland by her mother, Kate Frances Dick, being educated in Geneva, as well as at the Lycée Français in London. Her mother married a man named Paul Erick Dick when she was seven and he adopted her and she took his surname. In early life, Kay Dick worked at

Foyle's W & G Foyle Ltd. (usually called simply Foyles) is a bookseller with a chain of seven stores in England. It is best known for its flagship store in Charing Cross Road, London. Foyles was once listed in the ''Guinness Book of Records'' as the w ...

bookshop in London's

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and, at 26, became the first woman director in English publishing at P.S. King & Son. She later became a journalist, working at the ''

New Statesman The ''New Statesman'' is a British political and cultural magazine published in London. Founded as a weekly review of politics and literature on 12 April 1913, it was at first connected with Sidney and Beatrice Webb and other leading members ...

''. For many years, she edited the literary magazine '' The Windmill'', under the

pen name A pen name, also called a ''nom de plume'' or a literary double, is a pseudonym (or, in some cases, a variant form of a real name) adopted by an author and printed on the title page or by-line of their works in place of their real name. A pen na ...

Edward Lane. Dick wrote five novels between 1949 and 1962, including the famous ''An Affair of Love'' (1953) and ''Solitaire'' (1958). She also wrote

literary biography When studying literature, biography and its relationship to literature is often a subject of literary criticism, and is treated in several different forms. Two scholarly approaches use biography or biographical approaches to the past as a tool for i ...

, researching the lives of

Colette Sidonie-Gabrielle Colette (; 28 January 1873 – 3 August 1954), known mononymously as Colette, was a French author and woman of letters. She was also a mime, actress, and journalist. Colette is best known in the English-speaking world for her ...

and

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. In 1960 she published ''Pierrot'', about the ''

commedia dell'arte (; ; ) was an early form of professional theatre, originating from Italian theatre, that was popular throughout Europe between the 16th and 18th centuries. It was formerly called Italian comedy in English and is also known as , , and . Charact ...

''. Dick was a regular reviewer for ''

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'' (fou ...

'', ''

The Spectator ''The Spectator'' is a weekly British magazine on politics, culture, and current affairs. It was first published in July 1828, making it the oldest surviving weekly magazine in the world. It is owned by Frederick Barclay, who also owns ''The ...

'' and ''

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'', but the work dropped off as she failed to meet deadlines. Dick also edited several anthologies of stories and interviews with writers, including ''Ivy and Stevie'' (1971) and ''Friends and Friendship'' (1974). She was known for campaigning tirelessly and successfully for the introduction of the

Public Lending Right A Public Lending Right (PLR) is a program intended to either compensate authors for the potential loss of sales from their works being available in public libraries or as a governmental support of the arts, through support of works available in pu ...

, which pays

royalties A royalty payment is a payment made by one party to another that owns a particular asset, for the right to ongoing use of that asset. Royalties are typically agreed upon as a percentage of gross or net revenues derived from the use of an asset o ...

to authors when their books are borrowed from public libraries. In 1977, Dick published ''They'',Hall, Duncan (21 November 2014)
"Writer Graham Duff on Kay Dick's work of science fiction"
''The Argus''. a series of dream sequences that won the South-East Arts literature prize, and was described in ''

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, Philip ...

'' in 2020 as "a lost dystopian masterpiece". It had remained out of print due to poor sales and Dick experiencing harsh and sexist reviews in the press at the time of the award win. ''They'' was re-discovered by chance in an

Oxfam Oxfam is a British-founded confederation of 21 independent charitable organizations focusing on the alleviation of global poverty, founded in 1942 and led by Oxfam International. History Founded at 17 Broad Street, Oxford, as the Oxford Co ...

charity bookshop in

Bath, Somerset Bath () is a city in the Bath and North East Somerset unitary area in the county of Somerset, England, known for and named after its Roman-built baths. At the 2021 Census, the population was 101,557. Bath is in the valley of the River Avon, ...

, in the summer of 2020 by a literary agent. It was then acquired by Faber and Faber for re-release on 3 February 2022 in the United Kingdom and MacNally Editions in the United States. In 1984 she followed the publication of ''They'' with an acclaimed autobiographical novel, ''The Shelf'', in which she examined a lesbian affair. Dick lived for some two decades with the novelist Kathleen Farrell, from 1940 to 1962. She died from lung cancer at a nursing home in Brighton in 2001. She had a bitter and abusive obituary by

Michael De-la-Noy Michael De-la-Noy (3 April 1934 – 12 August 2002, born Michael Delanoy Walker) was a British journalist and author. He wrote more than 20 books, the most successful being ''The Queen Behind the Throne''. De-la-Noy was also noted for being fired ...

who she had helped early in his career.

Legacy

Dick's dystopian novel ''They'' was "rediscovered" in 2022 and it was celebrated with an event at the

British Library The British Library is the national library of the United Kingdom and is one of the largest libraries in the world. It is estimated to contain between 170 and 200 million items from many countries. As a legal deposit library, the British ...

as part of

LGBT History Month LGBT History Month is an annual month-long observance of lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender history, and the history of the List of LGBT rights by region, gay rights and related civil rights movements. It was founded in 1994 by Missouri high- ...

. She was credited as "the first woman director in English publishing".

Bibliography

*''By The Lake'' (1949) *''Young Man'' (1951) *''An Affair of Love'' (1953) *''Solitaire'' (1958) *''Pierrot'' (1960) *''Sunday'' (1962) *''Ivy & Stevie'' (1971) *''Friends & Friendship'' (1974) *''They'' (1977) *''The Shelf'' (1984)

References

External links

* Michael De-la-Noy
"Kay Dick" (obituary)
''The Guardian'', 24 October 2001. Michael Ratcliffe, Roy Greenslade
"Letters"
''The Guardian'', 25 October 2001.
Kay Dick's executors' website

Kay Dick photograph by John Vere Brown

National Portrait Gallery, London The National Portrait Gallery (NPG) is an art gallery in London housing a collection of portraits of historically important and famous British people. It was arguably the first national public gallery dedicated to portraits in the world when it ...

. *
Jeremy Scott
at LC Authorities, with 3 records, an
at WorldCat

"Kay Dick: A Preliminary Inventory of an Addition to Her Papers at the Harry Ransom Center"
{{DEFAULTSORT:Dick, Kay 1915 births 2001 deaths 20th-century biographers 20th-century British dramatists and playwrights 20th-century British short story writers 20th-century English novelists 20th-century English screenwriters 20th-century pseudonymous writers Alumni of Balliol College, Oxford English autobiographers English journalists English science fiction writers English short story writers Pseudonymous women writers