Muriel Spark
Born 1918 · Died 2006
Dame Muriel Spark, DBE was a prolific Scottish novelist, short story writer, and poet whose darkly comedic voice made her one of the most distinctive writers of the twentieth century.
Spark received the James Tait Black Memorial Prize in 1965 for The Mandelbaum Gate, the Ingersoll Foundation TS Eliot Award in 1992 and the David Cohen Prize in 1997. She became Dame Commander of the Order of the British Empire in 1993, in recognition of her services to literature. In 1998, she was awarded the Golden PEN Award by English PEN for "a Lifetime's Distinguished Service to Literature".
Spark received eight honorary doctorates in her lifetime. These included a Doctor of the University degree from her alma mater, Heriot-Watt University in 1995; a Doctor of Humane Letters from the American University of Paris in 2005; and Honorary Doctor of Letters degrees from the Universities of Aberdeen, Edinburgh, London, Oxford, St Andrews and Strathclyde.
Spark grew up in Edinburgh and worked as a department store secretary, writer for trade magazines, and literary editor before publishing her first novel, The Comforters, in 1957. The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie, published in 1961, and considered her masterpiece, was made into a stage play, a TV series, and a film.
Quotes
“New York, home of the vivisectors of the mind, and of the mentally vivisected still to be reassembled, of those who live intact, habitually wondering about their states of sanity, and home of those whose minds have been dead, bearing the scars of resurrection.”
p. 12 “A life like mine annoys most people; they go to their jobs every day, attend to things, give orders, pummel typewriters, and get two or three weeks off every year, and it vexes them to see someone else not bothering to do these things and yet getting away with it, not starving, being lucky as they call it.”
p. 109 "I am putting old heads on your young shoulders," Miss Brodie had told them at that time, "and all my pupils are the crème de la crème."
The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie, p. 5 “To me education is a leading out of what is already there in the pupil's soul. To Miss Mackay it is a putting in of something that is not there, and that is not what I call education, I call it intrusion.”
The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie, p. 36 “It is impossible to persuade a man who does not disagree, but smiles.”
The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie, p. 92
Quotes from Wikiquote (CC BY-SA 4.0).
Books by Muriel Spark in order
Books by Muriel Spark in the order they were published, from The Comforters (1957) to The Finishing School (2004).
- 1The Comforters
The Comforters1957 - 2The Go-away Bird, with Other Stories
The Go-away Bird, with Other Stories1958 - 3Memento Mori
Memento Mori1959 - 4The Bachelors
The Bachelors1960 - 5The Ballad of Peckham Rye
The Ballad of Peckham Rye1960 - 6The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie
The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie1961 - 7The Girls of Slender Means
The Girls of Slender Means1963 - 8The Mandelbaum Gate
The Mandelbaum Gate1965 - 9Collected Stories
Collected Stories1967 - 10The Public Image
The Public Image1968 - 11The Driver's Seat
The Driver's Seat1970 - 12Not to Disturb
Not to Disturb1971 - 13The Abbess of Crewe
The Abbess of Crewe1974 - 14The Takeover
The Takeover1976 - 15Territorial Rights
Territorial Rights1979 - 16Loitering with Intent
Loitering with Intent1981 - 17Mary Shelley
Mary Shelley1987 - 18A Far Cry from Kensington
A Far Cry from Kensington1988 - 19Symposium
Symposium1990 - 20Curriculum Vitae
Curriculum Vitae1992 - 21Aiding & Abetting
Aiding & Abetting2000 - 22All the Stories of Muriel Spark
All the Stories of Muriel Spark2001 - 23The Ghost Stories of Muriel Spark
The Ghost Stories of Muriel Spark2003 - 24The Finishing School
The Finishing School2004