Michèle Brigitte Roberts

FRSL The Royal Society of Literature (RSL) is a learned society founded in 1820, by King George IV, to "reward literary merit and excite literary talent". A charity that represents the voice of literature in the UK, the RSL has about 600 Fellows, elec ...

(born 20 May 1949) is a British writer, novelist and poet. She is the daughter of a French Catholic teacher mother (Monique Caulle) and English Protestant father (Reginald Roberts), and has dual UK–France nationality.

Early life

Roberts was born to a French Catholic mother and English Protestant father in Bushey, Hertfordshire, but raised in

Edgware Edgware () is a suburban town in northern Greater London, mostly in the London Borough of Barnet but with small parts falling in the London Borough of Harrow and in the London Borough of Brent. Edgware is centred north-northwest of Charing Cros ...

Middlesex Middlesex (; abbreviation: Middx) is a historic county in southeast England. Its area is almost entirely within the wider urbanised area of London and mostly within the ceremonial county of Greater London, with small sections in neighbourin ...

. She was educated at a convent, expecting to become a nun, before reading English at

Somerville College, Oxford Somerville College, a constituent college of the University of Oxford in England, was founded in 1879 as Somerville Hall, one of its first two women's colleges. Among its alumnae have been Margaret Thatcher, Indira Gandhi, Dorothy Hodgkin, Ir ...

, where she lost her Catholic faith. She also studied 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 = � ...

, training to be a librarian. She worked for the

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 la ...

Bangkok, Thailand Bangkok, officially known in Thai as Krung Thep Maha Nakhon and colloquially as Krung Thep, is the capital and most populous city of Thailand. The city occupies in the Chao Phraya River delta in central Thailand and has an estimated populatio ...

, in this role from 1973 to 1974.

Career

Active in socialist and feminist politics (the Women's Liberation Movement) since the early 1970s, she formed a writers' collective with Sara Maitland, Michelene Wandor and Zoe Fairbairns. At this time Roberts was the Poetry Editor (1975–77) at ''

Spare Rib ''Spare Rib'' was a Second-wave feminism, second-wave feminist magazine, founded in 1972 in the United Kingdom, that emerged from the Counterculture of the 1960s, counter culture of the late 1960s as a consequence of meetings involving, among ot ...

'', the feminist magazine, and later at ''

City Limits City limits or city boundaries refer to the defined boundary or border of a city. The area within the city limit can be called the city proper. Town limit/boundary and village limit/boundary apply to towns and villages. Similarly, corporate li ...

'' (1981–83). Her first novel, ''A Piece of the Night'', was published in 1978. Her 1992 novel ''Daughters of the House'' was shortlisted for the

Booker Prize 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. ...

, and won the 1993

WH Smith Literary Award The WH Smith Literary Award was an award founded in 1959 by British high street retailer W H Smith. Its founding aim was stated to be to "encourage and bring international esteem to authors of the British Commonwealth"; originally open to all r ...

. ''Paper Houses'', a memoir of her life since 1970, was published in 2007: "Drawing on her diaries of the period, she brings back a more political, though also hedonistic era of radical feminism, communes and demonstrations. And the friendships she made and has kept ever since, notably with fellow feminist writers such as Sara Maitland, Micheline Wandor and

Alison Fell Alison Fell (born 1944 in Dumfries, Scotland) is a Scottish poet and novelist with a particular interest in women's roles and political victims. Her poems have appeared in many anthologies. Her children's books also pass on social messages. Lif ...

. Roberts also self-analyzes the effects of her Anglo-French family’s Catholicism ('the nun in my head, that monstrous Mother Superior'), which have remained a fertile source, even as she reacted against its overt doctrines. Her exploration of London, the various areas and houses that she lived in, went alongside her development as a writer. For her, writing 'meant voyaging into the unknown and having adventures' though also 'bearing witness to other people’s stories as well as my own'." In her 2020 work, ''Negative Capability: A Diary of Surviving'', Roberts documents a period of crisis following the rejection of a novel she was writing by her publisher and agent. The title is taken from a quotation by Keats. Roberts is an Emeritus Professor of Creative Writing at the

University of East Anglia The University of East Anglia (UEA) is a public research university in Norwich, England. Established in 1963 on a campus west of the city centre, the university has four faculties and 26 schools of study. The annual income of the institution f ...

and was Visiting Professor in Writing at

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

for several years.

Honours and recognition

Roberts was elected as a Fellow of the

Royal Society of Literature The Royal Society of Literature (RSL) is a learned society founded in 1820, by King George IV, to "reward literary merit and excite literary talent". A charity that represents the voice of literature in the UK, the RSL has about 600 Fellows, ele ...

in 1999. She is a

Chevalier de l'Ordre des Arts et des Lettres The ''Ordre des Arts et des Lettres'' (Order of Arts and Letters) is an order of France established on 2 May 1957 by the Minister of Culture. Its supplementary status to the was confirmed by President Charles de Gaulle in 1963. Its purpose i ...

, awarded by the French government, but turned down an

OBE 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 o ...

as a consequence of her republican views.

Publications

Essays

*''Food, Sex & God: on Inspiration and Writing'', 1988,

Virago Press Virago is a British publisher of women's writing and books on feminist topics. Started and run by women in the 1970s and bolstered by the success of the Women's Liberation Movement (WLM), Virago has been credited as one of several British feminis ...

Novels

*'' A Piece of the Night'', 1978, Women's Press *''The Visitation'', 1978, Women's Press *'' The Wild Girl'' (also known as ''The Secret Gospel of Mary Magdalene''), 1984, Methuen *''The Book of Mrs Noah'', 1987, Methuen *''In the Red Kitchen'', 1990, Methuen *''Daughters of the House'', 1992, Virago and Morrow (USA) *''During Mother's Absence'', 1992, Virago *''Flesh & Blood'', 1994, Virago *''Impossible Saints'', 1998, Ecco Press *''Fair Exchange'', 1999, Little, Brown *''The Looking Glass'', 2000, Little, Brown *''The Mistressclass'', 2002, Little, Brown *''Reader, I Married Him'', 2006, Little, Brown *''Ignorance'', 2012,

Bloomsbury Publishing Bloomsbury Publishing plc is a British worldwide publishing house of fiction and non-fiction. It is a constituent of the FTSE SmallCap Index. Bloomsbury's head office is located in Bloomsbury, an area of the London Borough of Camden. It has ...

*''The Walworth Beauty'', 2017, Bloomsbury *''Cut Out'', 2021, Sandstone Press,

Poetry

*''Touch Papers: Three Women Poets'' (with Michelene Wandor and Judith Kazantzis), 1982,

Allison and Busby Allison & Busby (A & B) is a publishing house based in London established by Clive Allison and Margaret Busby in 1967. The company has built up a reputation as a leading independent publisher. Background Launching as a publishing company in Ma ...

*''The Mirror of the Mother'', 1986, Methuen *''Psyche and the Hurricane '', 1991, Methuen *''All the Selves I Was'', 1995, Virago

Short stories

*''Your Shoes'', 1991BBC English literature.
/ref> *''During Mother's Absence'', 1993, Virago *''Playing Sardines'', 2001, Virago *''Mud: Stories of Sex and Love'', 2010, Virago

Memoir

*''Paper Houses: A Memoir of the 70s and Beyond'', 2007, Virago, ; paperback 2008, *''Negative Capability: A Diary of Surviving'', 2020, Sandstone Press,

Bibliography

* Maria Soraya García-Sánchez: ''Travelling in Women's History with Michèle Roberts's Novels: Literature, Language and Culture''. Bern: Lang, 2011, * Susanne Gruss: ''The Pleasure of the Feminist Text: Reading Michèle Roberts and Angela Carter''. Amsterdam: Rodopi, 2009, * Nick Rennison: ''Contemporary British Novelists''. London: Routledge, Taylor & Francis, 2005, , p. 137–140.

References

External links

*
"Take risks"
''The Guardian'', 14 July 2007 – interview-based feature by Lucasta Miller * {{DEFAULTSORT:Roberts, Michele 1949 births 20th-century English women writers 20th-century English writers 21st-century English women writers Academics of Nottingham Trent University Academics of the University of East Anglia Alumni of Somerville College, Oxford Alumni of University College London British feminist writers British journalists British republicans British women academics British women short story writers English people of French descent English women novelists Fellows of the Royal Society of Literature Former Roman Catholics Living people People from Bushey People from Edgware