Miranda Jane Seymour (born 8 August 1948) is an English literary critic, novelist and biographer. The lives she has described have included those of

Robert Graves Captain Robert von Ranke Graves (24 July 1895 – 7 December 1985) was a British poet, historical novelist and critic. His father was Alfred Perceval Graves, a celebrated Irish poet and figure in the Gaelic revival; they were both Celtic ...

and

Mary Shelley Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley (; ; 30 August 1797 – 1 February 1851) was an English novelist who wrote the Gothic fiction, Gothic novel ''Frankenstein, Frankenstein; or, The Modern Prometheus'' (1818), which is considered an History of scie ...

. Seymour, a Fellow of the

Royal Society of Literature The Royal Society of Literature (RSL) is a learned society founded in 1820, by George IV of the United Kingdom, King George IV, to "reward literary merit and excite literary talent". A charity that represents the voice of literature in the UK, th ...

, has in recent years been a visiting Professor of English Studies at

Nottingham Trent University Nottingham Trent University (NTU) is a public research university in Nottingham, England. It was founded as a new university in 1992, although its roots go back to 1843 with the establishment of the Nottingham Government School of Design, w ...

and a Fellow of the

Royal Society of Arts The Royal Society for the Encouragement of Arts, Manufactures and Commerce (RSA), also known as the Royal Society of Arts, is a London-based organisation committed to finding practical solutions to social challenges. The RSA acronym is used m ...

Early life and education

Miranda Seymour was two years old when her parents moved into

Thrumpton Hall Thrumpton Hall is an English country house in the village of Thrumpton near Nottingham. It operated as a wedding venue until November 2020. History This historic house incorporates a substantial part of an older house which was occupied by t ...

, the family ancestral home, a Jacobean mansion in the quiet village of

Thrumpton Thrumpton is a village and civil parish in Nottinghamshire, England. At the time of the 2001 census it had a population of 152, increasing to 165 at the 2011 census. It is located on the A453 road south-west of West Bridgford. The 13th centur ...

Nottinghamshire Nottinghamshire (; abbreviated Notts.) is a landlocked county in the East Midlands region of England, bordering South Yorkshire to the north-west, Lincolnshire to the east, Leicestershire to the south, and Derbyshire to the west. The traditi ...

, on the south bank of the

River Trent The Trent is the Longest rivers of the United Kingdom, third-longest river in the United Kingdom. Its Source (river or stream), source is in Staffordshire, on the southern edge of Biddulph Moor. It flows through and drains the North Midland ...

. She studied at

Bedford College, London file:Bedford College in York place - photographer is unknown but guess 1908.png, Bedford College was in York Place after 1874 Bedford College was founded in London in 1849 as the first higher education college for education of women, women in th ...

, now part of

Royal Holloway, University of London 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 ...

, earning a BA in English in 1981.

Career

Seymour's works include biographies of

Lady Ottoline Morrell Lady Ottoline Violet Anne Morrell (16 June 1873 – 21 April 1938) was an English aristocrat and society hostess. Her patronage was influential in artistic and intellectual circles, where she befriended writers including Aldous Huxley, Sieg ...

and

, about whom she also wrote a novel, ''The Telling'' and a radio play, ''Sea Music''. She wrote a group portrait of

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 ...

in his later years, entitled ''A Ring of Conspirators''. In 2001, she came across material on

Hellé Nice Hellé Nice (born Mariette Hélène Delangle; 15 December 1900 – 1 October 1984) was a French model, dancer, and a motor racing driver who competed in numerous minor Grands Prix and other races between 1928 and 1939, whose racing career was imp ...

, a forgotten French Grand Prix racing driver of the 1930s. After extensive research, Seymour published an acclaimed book in 2004 about Nice's ultimately tragic life. In 2008 she published ''In My Father's House: Elegy for an Obsessive Love'' (

Simon & Schuster Simon & Schuster () is an American publishing company and a subsidiary of Paramount Global. It was founded in New York City on January 2, 1924 by Richard L. Simon and M. Lincoln Schuster. As of 2016, Simon & Schuster was the third largest publ ...

, UK), which appeared in the US as ''

'' (

HarperCollins HarperCollins Publishers LLC is one of the Big Five English-language publishing companies, alongside Penguin Random House, Simon & Schuster, Hachette, and Macmillan. The company is headquartered in New York City and is a subsidiary of News Cor ...

) and won the 2008 Pen Ackerley Prize for Memoir of the Year. Another unusual life she traced was of a 1930s film star,

Virginia Cherrill Virginia Cherrill (April 12, 1908 – November 14, 1996) was an American actress best known for her role as the blind flower girl in Charlie Chaplin's ''City Lights'' (1931). Early life Virginia Cherrill was born on a farm in rural Carthag ...

, based on a substantial archive in private ownership. ''Noble Endeavours: Stories from England; Stories from Germany'' appeared in September 2013 from Simon & Schuster. Seymour's ''In Byron's Wake'' (2018) covers the lives of

Lord Byron George Gordon Byron, 6th Baron Byron (22 January 1788 – 19 April 1824), known simply as Lord Byron, was an English romantic poet and Peerage of the United Kingdom, peer. He was one of the leading figures of the Romantic movement, and h ...

's wife and daughter,

Annabella Milbanke Anne Isabella Noel Byron, 11th Baroness Wentworth and Baroness Byron (''née'' Milbanke; 17 May 1792 – 16 May 1860), nicknamed Annabella and commonly known as Lady Byron, was wife of poet George Gordon Byron, more commonly known as Lord Byro ...

and

Ada Lovelace Augusta Ada King, Countess of Lovelace (''née'' Byron; 10 December 1815 – 27 November 1852) was an English mathematician and writer, chiefly known for her work on Charles Babbage's proposed mechanical general-purpose computer, the A ...

Personal life

In 1972, Seymour married the novelist and historian

Andrew Sinclair Andrew Annandale Sinclair FRSL FRSA (21 January 1935 – 30 May 2019) was a British novelist, historian, biographer, critic, filmmaker, and a publisher of classic and modern film scripts. He has been described as a "writer of extraordinary flu ...

and had a son, Merlin. Her second marriage, to

Anthony Gottlieb Anthony John Gottlieb (born 1956) is a British writer, author, historian of ideas, and former Executive Editor of The ''Economist''. He is the author of two major works on the history of philosophy, '' The Dream of Reason'' and '' The Dream of Enli ...

, then executive editor of ''

The Economist ''The Economist'' is a British weekly newspaper printed in demitab format and published digitally. It focuses on current affairs, international business, politics, technology, and culture. Based in London, the newspaper is owned by The Econo ...

'' and author of a history of Western philosophy, ended in 2003. A transatlantic literary room-swap led to a third marriage in 2006 to Ted Lynch, a Bostonian. Seymour now divides her time between London and Thrumpton Hall, a Nottinghamshire residence which has been in private ownership for 500 years

Bibliography

Fiction

References

External links

Official homepage
with

Ramona Koval Ramona Koval (born 1954, Melbourne) is an Australian broadcaster, writer and journalist. Her parents were Yiddish-speaking survivors of The Holocaust who arrived in Melbourne from Poland in 1950. Koval is known for her extended and in-depth in ...

The Book Show Radio National, known on-air as RN, is an Australia-wide public service broadcasting radio network run by the Australian Broadcasting Corporation (ABC). From 1947 until 1985, the network was known as ABC Radio 2. History 1937: Predecessors an ...

ABC Radio National Radio National, known on-air as RN, is an Australia-wide public service broadcasting radio network run by the Australian Broadcasting Corporation (ABC). From 1947 until 1985, the network was known as ABC Radio 2. History 1937: Predecessors an ...

1 April 2007
''House Proud'' Book review of ''Thrumpton Hall: A Memoir of Life in My Father's House'' by Charles McGrath ''New York Times'' 27 July 2008'The Knife by the Handle at Last'

Tim Parks Timothy Harold Parks (born 19 December 1954) is a British novelist, translator, author and professor of literature. Career He is the author of eighteen novels (notably ''Europa'', which was shortlisted for the Booker Prize in 1997). His first ...

review of ''Thrumpton Hall: A Memoir of Life in My Father's House'' from ''

The New York Review of Books ''The New York Review of Books'' (or ''NYREV'' or ''NYRB'') is a semi-monthly magazine with articles on literature, culture, economics, science and current affairs. Published in New York City, it is inspired by the idea that the discussion of i ...

'' - Subscription based {{DEFAULTSORT:Seymour, Miranda 1948 births Living people Academics of Nottingham Trent University Alumni of Bedford College, London English biographers English journalists Fellows of the Royal Society of Literature