Pernel Strachey or Joan Pernel Strachey (4 March 1876 – 19 December 1951) was an English scholar of French and Principal of

Newnham College 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 Millicent ...

Life

Strachey was born in

Clapham Common Clapham Common is a large triangular urban park in Clapham, south London, England. Originally common land for the parishes of Battersea and Clapham, it was converted to parkland under the terms of the Metropolitan Commons Act 1878. It is of gr ...

in London in 1876. She came from a large family led by Lieutenant General Sir

Richard Strachey Sir Richard Strachey (24 July 1817 – 12 February 1908) was a British soldier and Indian administrator, the third son of Edward Strachey and grandson of Sir Henry Strachey, 1st Baronet. Early life He was born on 24 July 1817, at Sutton ...

and the suffragist Jane Maria Strachey. Her mother was a friend of

Millicent Garrett Fawcett Dame Millicent Garrett Fawcett (née Garrett; 11 June 1847 – 5 August 1929) was an English politician, writer and feminist. She campaigned for women's suffrage by legal change and in 1897–1919 led Britain's largest women's rights associati ...

who had co-founded Newnham College in Cambridge. Her brothers included

Lytton Strachey Giles Lytton Strachey (; 1 March 1880 – 21 January 1932) was an English writer and critic. A founding member of the Bloomsbury Group and author of ''Eminent Victorians'', he established a new form of biography in which psychological insight ...

and

Oliver Strachey Oliver Strachey CBE (3 November 1874 – 14 May 1960), a British civil servant in the Foreign Office, was a cryptographer from World War I to World War II. Life and work Strachey was a son of Sir Richard Strachey, colonial administrator and ...

, husband of Ray Costelloe. The Strachey family background emphasised the life of the mind: "As a member of the large and distinguished Strachey family..., she shared its characteristically lively intellectual interests, wit and argumentative engagement with ideas. In manner she appeared shy and withdrawn ... but this veiled both kindness and a humorous regard for life’s problems." StracheyFamily

Strachey went to Allenswood School.Pernel Strachey
National Archives, Retrieved 6 March 2017 in 1895, she went to

, one of the two new women's colleges at the

University of Cambridge , mottoeng = Literal: From here, light and sacred draughts. Non literal: From this place, we gain enlightenment and precious knowledge. , established = , other_name = The Chancellor, Masters and Schola ...

. After first studying history, she transferred to Modern and Medieval Languages, as a scholar of early French. She studied at Paris, and by 1900 she was lecturing at

Royal Holloway College Royal Holloway, University of London (RHUL), formally incorporated as Royal Holloway and Bedford New College, is a public research university and a constituent college of the federal University of London. It has six schools, 21 academic departm ...

in London. Strachey returned to Newnham College in 1905 as lecturer in French and Romance languages, becoming Director of Studies in modern and medieval languages in 1917. From 1909 she was heavily involved in administrative work for the college. The existence of women's educational establishments at Cambridge was still controversial, and women could not yet receive Cambridge degrees. Strachey played a leading role in the campaign for degrees for women, but it would not succeed during her time at Cambridge. She became Principal of

in 1927, a post she retained until her retirement in 1941. "As Principal, Pernel Strachey showed an acute ability, deceptively hidden, for management, fund-raising and an awareness of every aspect of college life. Surprisingly for one from a Bloomsbury background she maintained strict ideas about student behaviour and was described by many as too conservative. ... At Council meetings she seems always to have maintained an amused but restraining hand." Her biographer describes her as "a witty and fluent speaker and debater. She possessed the easy but polished politeness of an earlier and more formal era which reflected the upper class moeurs of her family – and which was much missed by many when she left." She used her friendship with the

Bloomsbury Group The Bloomsbury Group—or Bloomsbury Set—was a group of associated English writers, intellectuals, philosophers and artists in the first half of the 20th century, including Virginia Woolf, John Maynard Keynes, E. M. Forster and Lytton Strac ...

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 ...

to get Woolf to deliver a talk in 1928. Woolf stayed at Newnham and her talk to the Newnham Arts Society was the basis for her essay ''

A Room of One's Own ''A Room of One's Own'' is an extended essay by Virginia Woolf, first published in September 1929. The work is based on two lectures Woolf delivered in October 1928 at Newnham College and Girton College, women's colleges at the University of C ...

''.Newnham Essay Prize
Newnham College, Retrieved 6 March 2017 After retirement in 1941, Strachey hoped to find time for research in her field of Anglo-Norman literature, but increasing ill health, and the pressure of wartime, did not allow this. Strachey died at the family's Bloomsbury home (since 1919), no. 51

Gordon Square Gordon Square is a public park square in Bloomsbury, London, England. It is part of the Bedford Estate and was designed as one of a pair with the nearby Tavistock Square. It is owned by the University of London. History and buildings The sq ...

in London, on 19 December 1951, aged 75.Rita McWilliams Tullberg, ‘Strachey, (Joan) Pernel (1876–1951)’, Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, Oxford University Press, 200
accessed 6 March 2017
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References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Strachey, Pernel 1876 births 1951 deaths People from Clapham Academics of Royal Holloway, University of London Principals of Newnham College, Cambridge Alumni of Newnham College, Cambridge Pernel