Dame Antonia Susan Duffy (; 24 August 1936 – 16 November 2023), known professionally by her former married name, A.S. Byatt ( ), was an English critic, novelist, poet and short-story writer. Her books have been translated into more than thirty languages. After attending the

University of Cambridge The University of Cambridge is a Public university, public collegiate university, collegiate research university in Cambridge, England. Founded in 1209, the University of Cambridge is the List of oldest universities in continuous operation, wo ...

, she married in 1959 and moved to Durham. It was during Byatt's time at university that she began working on her first two novels, subsequently published by Chatto & Windus as ''Shadow of a Sun'' (1964; reprinted in 1991 with its originally intended title, ''The Shadow of the Sun'') and ''The Game'' (1967). Byatt took a teaching job in 1972 to help pay for the education of her son. In the same week she accepted, a drunk driver killed her son as he walked home from school. He was 11 years of age. Byatt spent a symbolic 11 years teaching, then began full-time writing in 1983. '' The Virgin in the Garden'' (1978) was the first of ''The Quartet'', a tetralogy of novels that continued with ''

Still Life A still life (: still lifes) is a work of art depicting mostly wikt:inanimate, inanimate subject matter, typically commonplace objects which are either natural (food, flowers, dead animals, plants, rocks, shells, etc.) or artificiality, human-m ...

'' (1985), '' Babel Tower'' (1996) and '' A Whistling Woman'' (2002). Byatt's novel '' Possession: A Romance'' received the 1990 Booker Prize, while her short story collection '' The Djinn in the Nightingale's Eye'' (1994) received the 1995 Aga Khan Prize for Fiction. Her novel '' The Children's Book'' was shortlisted for the 2009 Booker Prize and won the 2010 James Tait Black Memorial Prize. Her critical work includes two studies of Dame Iris Murdoch (who was a friend and mentor), ''Degrees of Freedom: The Early Novels of Iris Murdoch'' (1965) and ''Iris Murdoch: A Critical Study'' (1976). Her other critical studies include ''Wordsworth and Coleridge in Their Time'' (1970) and ''Portraits in Fiction'' (2001). Byatt was awarded the Shakespeare Prize in 2002, the Erasmus Prize in 2016, the Park Kyong-ni Prize in 2017 and the Hans Christian Andersen Literature Award in 2018. She was mentioned as a candidate for the Nobel Prize in Literature.

Early life

Antonia Susan Drabble was born in

Sheffield Sheffield is a city in South Yorkshire, England, situated south of Leeds and east of Manchester. The city is the administrative centre of the City of Sheffield. It is historically part of the West Riding of Yorkshire and some of its so ...

, England, on 24 August 1936, as the eldest child of John Frederick Drabble, QC, later a County Court judge, and Kathleen Bloor, a scholar of Browning. Her sisters are the novelist Margaret Drabble and the art historian Helen Langdon. Her brother Richard Drabble KC is a

barrister A barrister is a type of lawyer in common law jurisdiction (area), jurisdictions. Barristers mostly specialise in courtroom advocacy and litigation. Their tasks include arguing cases in courts and tribunals, drafting legal pleadings, jurisprud ...

. The Drabble father participated in the placement of Jewish refugees in Sheffield during the 1930s. The mother was a Shavian and the father a Quaker. As a result of the bombing of Sheffield during the

Second World War World War II or the Second World War (1 September 1939 – 2 September 1945) was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War II, Allies and the Axis powers. World War II by country, Nearly all of the wo ...

the family moved to

York York is a cathedral city in North Yorkshire, England, with Roman Britain, Roman origins, sited at the confluence of the rivers River Ouse, Yorkshire, Ouse and River Foss, Foss. It has many historic buildings and other structures, such as a Yor ...

. Byatt was educated at two independent boarding schools, Sheffield High School and The Mount School, a Quaker boarding school at York. An unhappy child, Byatt did not enjoy boarding school, citing her need to be alone and her difficulty in making friends. Severe asthma often kept her in bed where reading became an escape from a difficult household. She attended Newnham College, Cambridge, Bryn Mawr College (in the United States), and Somerville College, Oxford. Having studied French, German, Latin and English at school, she later studied Italian while attending Cambridge so that she could read

Dante Dante Alighieri (; most likely baptized Durante di Alighiero degli Alighieri; – September 14, 1321), widely known mononymously as Dante, was an Italian Italian poetry, poet, writer, and philosopher. His ''Divine Comedy'', originally called ...

. Byatt lectured in the Department of Extra-Mural Studies of the

University of London The University of London (UoL; abbreviated as Lond or more rarely Londin in Post-nominal letters, post-nominals) is a collegiate university, federal Public university, public research university located in London, England, United Kingdom. The ...

(1962–71), the Central School of Art and Design and from 1972 to 1983 at

University College London University College London (Trade name, branded as UCL) is a Public university, public research university in London, England. It is a Member institutions of the University of London, member institution of the Federal university, federal Uni ...

. She began writing full-time in 1983.

Personal life and death

Byatt married Ian Charles Rayner Byatt in 1959 and moved to Durham. They had a daughter together, as well as a son, Charles, who was killed by a drunk-driver at the age of 11 while walking home from school. She spoke of her son's death and its influence on her lecturing and subsequent career after publishing '' The Children's Book'', in which the image of a dead child features. She came to regard her academic career symbolically. She later wrote the poem "Dead Boys". The marriage was dissolved in 1969. Later that year, Byatt married Peter Duffy, and they had two daughters. Byatt's relationship with her sister Margaret Drabble was sometimes strained due to the presence of autobiographical elements in both their writing. While their relationship was no longer especially close and they did not read each other's books, Drabble described the situation as "normal sibling rivalry" and Byatt said it had been "terribly overstated by gossip columnists." Byatt was an agnostic, though she maintained an affinity for Quaker services. She enjoyed watching

snooker Snooker (pronounced , ) is a cue sport played on a rectangular Billiard table#Snooker and English billiards tables, billiards table covered with a green cloth called baize, with six Billiard table#Pockets 2, pockets: one at each corner and ...

, tennis, and

football Football is a family of team sports that involve, to varying degrees, kick (football), kicking a football (ball), ball to score a goal (sports), goal. Unqualified, football (word), the word ''football'' generally means the form of football t ...

. Byatt lived primarily in Putney, and died at home on 16 November 2023, at the age of 87.

Influences

Byatt was influenced by Henry James and George Eliot as well as Emily Dickinson, T. S. Eliot,

Samuel Taylor Coleridge Samuel Taylor Coleridge ( ; 21 October 177225 July 1834) was an English poet, literary critic, philosopher, and theologian who was a founder of the Romantic Movement in England and a member of the Lake Poets with his friend William Wordsworth ...

Tennyson Alfred Tennyson, 1st Baron Tennyson (; 6 August 1809 – 6 October 1892) was an English poet. He was the Poet Laureate of the United Kingdom, Poet Laureate during much of Queen Victoria's reign. In 1829, Tennyson was awarded the Chancellor's ...

and

Robert Browning Robert Browning (7 May 1812 – 12 December 1889) was an English poet and playwright whose dramatic monologues put him high among the Victorian literature, Victorian poets. He was noted for irony, characterization, dark humour, social commentar ...

, in merging realism and naturalism with fantasy. She was not an admirer of the

Brontë family The Brontës () were a 19th century literary family, born in the village of Thornton, West Yorkshire, Thornton and later associated with the village of Haworth in the West Riding of Yorkshire, England. The sisters, Charlotte Brontë, Charlott ...

, nor did she like Christina Rossetti. She was ambivalent about D. H. Lawrence. She knew

Jane Austen Jane Austen ( ; 16 December 1775 – 18 July 1817) was an English novelist known primarily for #List of works, her six novels, which implicitly interpret, critique, and comment on the English landed gentry at the end of the 18th century ...

's work off by heart before her teens. In her books, Byatt alluded to, and built upon, themes from Romantic and Victorian literature. She cited art historian John Gage's book on the theory of colour as one of her favourite books to reread.

Writing

Fiction

Byatt wrote a lot while attending boarding school but had most of it burnt before she left. She began writing her first novel while at the

, where she did not attend many lectures but when she did, she passed the time attempting to write a novel, which—given her limited experience of life—involved a young woman at university trying to write a novel, a novel, her novel, which—she knew—was "no good". She left it in a drawer when she was finished. After departing Cambridge, she spent one year as a postgraduate student in the United States and began her second novel, ''The Game'', continuing to write it at Oxford when she returned to England. After getting married in 1959 and moving to Durham, she left ''The Game'' aside and resumed work on her earlier novel. She sent it to literary critic John Beer, whom she had befriended while at Cambridge. Beer sent Byatt's novel to the independent book publishing company Chatto & Windus. From there Cecil Day-Lewis wrote her a response and invited her to lunch at The Athenaeum. Day-Lewis was Byatt's first editor; D. J. Enright would succeed him. ''Shadow of a Sun'', Byatt's first novel, is about a girl and her father and was published in 1964. It was reprinted in 1991 with its originally intended title, ''The Shadow of the Sun'', intact. ''The Game'', published in 1967, concerned the dynamics between two sisters. The reception for Byatt's first books became confused with her sister's writing; her sister had a quicker rate of publication. The family theme is continued in ''The Quartet'', Byatt's tetralogy of novels, which begins with '' The Virgin in the Garden'' (1978) and continues with ''

'' (1985), '' Babel Tower'' (1996) and '' A Whistling Woman'' (2002). Her quartet is inspired by D. H. Lawrence, particularly '' The Rainbow'' and '' Women in Love''. The family portrayed in the quartet are from

Yorkshire Yorkshire ( ) is an area of Northern England which was History of Yorkshire, historically a county. Despite no longer being used for administration, Yorkshire retains a strong regional identity. The county was named after its county town, the ...

. Byatt said the idea for ''The Virgin in the Garden'' came in part from an class she taught in which she had read Tolstoy and Dostoevsky and in part from her time living in Durham in 1961, the year in which her son was born. The book was an attempt to understand what could be achieved if '' Middlemarch'' were written in the middle of the twentieth century. Byatt's book features a powerful death scene, which she invented in 1961 (inspired by Byatt's reading of Angus Wilson's book '' The Middle Age of Mrs Eliot'' and the accident in its opening), a death scene that has drawn complaints from numerous readers for its vividness. Describing mid-20th-century Britain, the books follow the life of Frederica Potter, a young intellectual studying at Cambridge at a time when women were heavily outnumbered by men at that university, and then tracing her journey as a divorcée with a young son as he makes a new life in London. Byatt says some of the characters in her fiction represent her "greatest terror which is simple domesticity." Like ''Babel Tower'', ''A Whistling Woman'' touches on the

utopia A utopia ( ) typically describes an imagined community or society that possesses highly desirable or near-perfect qualities for its members. It was coined by Sir Thomas More for his 1516 book ''Utopia (book), Utopia'', which describes a fictiona ...

n and revolutionary dreams of the 1960s. Also an accomplished short story writer, Byatt's first published collection was ''Sugar and Other Stories'' (1987). ''The Matisse Stories'' (1993) features three pieces, each describing a painting by the eponymous painter; each is the tale of an initially smaller crisis that shows the long-present unravelling in the protagonists' lives. '' The Djinn in the Nightingale's Eye'', published in 1994, is a collection of

fairy tale A fairy tale (alternative names include fairytale, fairy story, household tale, magic tale, or wonder tale) is a short story that belongs to the folklore genre. Such stories typically feature magic, enchantments, and mythical or fanciful bei ...

s. Byatt's other short story collections are ''Elementals: Stories of Fire and Ice'', published in 1998, and ''Little Black Book of Stories'', published in 2003. Her books reflect a continuous interest in

zoology Zoology ( , ) is the scientific study of animals. Its studies include the anatomy, structure, embryology, Biological classification, classification, Ethology, habits, and distribution of all animals, both living and extinction, extinct, and ...

entomology Entomology (from Ancient Greek ἔντομον (''éntomon''), meaning "insect", and -logy from λόγος (''lógos''), meaning "study") is the branch of zoology that focuses on insects. Those who study entomology are known as entomologists. In ...

, geology, and Darwinism among other repeated themes. She is also interested in

linguistics Linguistics is the scientific study of language. The areas of linguistic analysis are syntax (rules governing the structure of sentences), semantics (meaning), Morphology (linguistics), morphology (structure of words), phonetics (speech sounds ...

and takes a keen interest in the translation of her books. Byatt said: "I can't say how important it was to me when

Angela Carter Angela Olive Pearce (formerly Carter, Stalker; 7 May 1940 – 16 February 1992), who published under the name Angela Carter, was an English novelist, short story writer, poet, and journalist, known for her feminist, magical realism, and picar ...

said 'I grew up on fairy stories—they're much more important to me than realist narratives'. I hadn't had the nerve to think that until she said it, and I owe her a great deal". Carter, in an earlier (first) meeting with Byatt after a Stevie Smith poetry reading, had dismissed Byatt's work, so this change of heart vindicated Byatt's approach to writing and Byatt readily acknowledged it. '' Possession'' (1990) parallels the emerging relationship of two contemporary academics with the lives of two (fictional) 19th-century poets whom they are researching. It won the 1990 Booker Prize and was adapted for a film released in 2002. Byatt's novella '' Morpho Eugenia'' was included in ''Angels & Insects'' (1992), which was turned into the eponymous 1995 film; that film received an Academy Award for Best Costume Design in 1997. Byatt's novel '' The Biographer's Tale'', published in 2000, she originally intended as a short story titled "The Biography of a Biographer", based on her notion of a biographer's life in a library investigating another person's life. This she developed into writing about a character called Phineas G. Nanson, who is attempting to learn about a biographer for a book he intends to write, but who can only locate fragments of his three unwritten biographies, which are on Galton,

Ibsen Henrik Johan Ibsen (; ; 20 March 1828 – 23 May 1906) was a Norwegian playwright, poet and actor. Ibsen is considered the world's pre-eminent dramatist of the 19th century and is often referred to as "the father of modern drama." He pioneered ...

and

Linnaeus Carl Linnaeus (23 May 1707 – 10 January 1778), also known after ennoblement in 1761 as Carl von Linné,#Blunt, Blunt (2004), p. 171. was a Swedish biologist and physician who formalised binomial nomenclature, the modern system of naming o ...

. Phineas Gilbert Nanson is named after an insect and is almost an

anagram An anagram is a word or phrase formed by rearranging the letters of a different word or phrase, typically using all the original letters exactly once. For example, the word ''anagram'' itself can be rearranged into the phrase "nag a ram"; which ...

of Galton, Ibsen and Linnaeus, though Byatt said this was an uncanny coincidence that she did not realise until afterwards. '' The Children's Book'', published in 2009, is a novel spanning from 1895 until the end of the

First World War World War I or the First World War (28 July 1914 – 11 November 1918), also known as the Great War, was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War I, Allies (or Entente) and the Central Powers. Fighting to ...

, centring on the fictional writer Olive Wellwood. She is based upon E. Nesbit. Another character—Herbert Methley—is a combination of

H. G. Wells Herbert George Wells (21 September 1866 – 13 August 1946) was an English writer, prolific in many genres. He wrote more than fifty novels and dozens of short stories. His non-fiction output included works of social commentary, politics, hist ...

and D. H. Lawrence, according to Byatt. The novel also features Rupert Brooke,

Emma Goldman Emma Goldman (June 27, 1869 – May 14, 1940) was a Russian-born Anarchism, anarchist revolutionary, political activist, and writer. She played a pivotal role in the development of anarchist political philosophy in North America and Europ ...

, Auguste Rodin,

George Bernard Shaw George Bernard Shaw (26 July 1856 – 2 November 1950), known at his insistence as Bernard Shaw, was an Irish playwright, critic, polemicist and political activist. His influence on Western theatre, culture and politics extended from the 188 ...

, Virginia Woolf and

Oscar Wilde Oscar Fingal O'Fflahertie Wills Wilde (16 October 185430 November 1900) was an Irish author, poet, and playwright. After writing in different literary styles throughout the 1880s, he became one of the most popular and influential playwright ...

, all appearing as themselves. Byatt initially intended to title the book ''The Hedgehog, the White Goose and the Mad March Hare''. She wrote at her home in Putney, West London, and at another house in the Cévennes in

Southern France Southern France, also known as the south of France or colloquially in French as , is a geographical area consisting of the regions of France that border the Atlantic Ocean south of the Marais Poitevin,Louis Papy, ''Le midi atlantique'', Atlas e ...

, where she spent her summers. She did not write her fiction on a computer, she did so by hand, though she had deployed a computer for non-fiction articles. According to a 1991 unpublished interview with the '' Los Angeles Times Book Review'', Byatt said she began her writing day at around 10 a.m., prompting herself by reading something easy and then something harder: "And then after a bit if I read something difficult that's really interesting I get this itch to start writing. So what I like to do is to write from about half past twelve, one, through to about four". At this point, she said, she would begin reading again.

Criticism

Byatt wrote two critical studies of Dame Iris Murdoch, who was a friend, mentor and another significant influence on her own writing. They were titled ''Degrees of Freedom: The Early Novels of Iris Murdoch'' (1965) and ''Iris Murdoch: A Critical Study'' (1976). Byatt also described Murdoch's husband John Bayley's decision to publish a memoir of his time with her as "wicked" and "unforgivable", saying: "I knew her enough to know that she would have hated it... it's had a horrible effect on how people feel about her and see her and think about her." Byatt's other critical studies include ''Wordsworth and Coleridge in Their Time'' (1970). 2001's ''Portraits in Fiction'' is about painting in novels, and features references to Emile Zola, Marcel Proust and Iris Murdoch; Byatt had earlier touched upon this subject in a 2000 lecture she delivered at the National Portrait Gallery in London. Byatt had been a public encourager of the new young generation of British writers, including Philip Hensher (''Kitchen Venom''), Robert Irwin (''Exquisite Corpse''), A. L. Kennedy, Lawrence Norfolk, David Mitchell ('' Ghostwritten''), Ali Smith ('' Hotel World''), Zadie Smith ('' White Teeth'') and Adam Thirlwell, saying in 2009 that she was "not entirely disinterested, because I wish there to be a literary world in which people are not writing books only about people's feelings ... all the ones I like write also about ideas". She contrasted some of those preferences with the work of Martin Amis, Julian Barnes, Ian McEwan and Graham Swift—then added, "In fact I admire all four of those writers... they don't only do people's feelings... nevertheless it's become ossified". Norfolk she described in 2003 as "the best of the young novelists now writing". She also spoke of her admiration for American writer Helen DeWitt's book '' The Last Samurai''. Hensher, who counts Byatt as a friend, said: "She's very unusual for an English person, in that she's quite suspicious of comedy. With most people, sooner or later, every intellectual position comes down to a joke—it never does with her." Byatt was a judge on many literary award panels, including the Betty Trask Award, the David Higham Prize for Fiction, the Hawthornden Prize and the Booker. She also wrote for the media, including for '' The Times Literary Supplement'', British journal '' Prospect'' and newspapers ''

The Guardian ''The Guardian'' is a British daily newspaper. It was founded in Manchester in 1821 as ''The Manchester Guardian'' and changed its name in 1959, followed by a move to London. Along with its sister paper, ''The Guardian Weekly'', ''The Guardi ...

'', ''

The Independent ''The Independent'' is a British online newspaper. It was established in 1986 as a national morning printed paper. Nicknamed the ''Indy'', it began as a broadsheet and changed to tabloid format in 2003. The last printed edition was publis ...

'' and ''

The Sunday Times ''The Sunday Times'' is a British Sunday newspaper whose circulation makes it the largest in Britain's quality press market category. It was founded in 1821 as ''The New Observer''. It is published by Times Newspapers Ltd, a subsidiary of N ...

''.

Awards and honours

Byatt was mentioned as a candidate for the Nobel Prize in Literature.

Honours

Byatt was appointed

Commander of the Order of the British Empire The Most Excellent Order of the British Empire is a British order of chivalry, rewarding valuable service in a wide range of useful activities. It comprises five classes of awards across both civil and military divisions, the most senior two o ...

(CBE) in the 1990 New Year Honours, and was promoted to Dame Commander of the Order of the British Empire (DBE), "for services to Literature", in

Elizabeth II Elizabeth II (Elizabeth Alexandra Mary; 21 April 19268 September 2022) was Queen of the United Kingdom and other Commonwealth realms from 6 February 1952 until Death and state funeral of Elizabeth II, her death in 2022. ...

's 1999 Birthday Honours. She was also awarded: * 1991: Honorary DLitt from the

Durham University Durham University (legally the University of Durham) is a collegiate university, collegiate public university, public research university in Durham, England, founded by an Act of Parliament (UK), Act of Parliament in 1832 and incorporated by r ...

*1993: Honorary LittD from the

University of Liverpool The University of Liverpool (abbreviated UOL) is a Public university, public research university in Liverpool, England. Founded in 1881 as University College Liverpool, Victoria University (United Kingdom), Victoria University, it received Ro ...

*1994: Honorary Doctorate from the University of Portsmouth *1995: Honorary Doctorate from the

*1999: Honorary DLitt from the

*1999: Honorary Fellow, Newnham College, Cambridge *2004: Honorary Doctor of Letters from the

University of Kent The University of Kent (formerly the University of Kent at Canterbury, abbreviated as UKC) is a Collegiate university, collegiate public university, public research university based in Kent, United Kingdom. The university was granted its roya ...

*2004: Honorary Fellow,

*2008: ''

The Times ''The Times'' is a British Newspaper#Daily, daily Newspaper#National, national newspaper based in London. It began in 1785 under the title ''The Daily Universal Register'', adopting its modern name on 1 January 1788. ''The Times'' and its si ...

'' named her on its list of the 50 greatest British writers since 1945 *2010: Honorary doctorate from

Leiden University Leiden University (abbreviated as ''LEI''; ) is a Public university, public research university in Leiden, Netherlands. Established in 1575 by William the Silent, William, Prince of Orange as a Protestantism, Protestant institution, it holds the d ...

*2017:

Fellow of the British Academy Fellowship of the British Academy (post-nominal letters FBA) is an award granted by the British Academy to leading academics for their distinction in the humanities and social sciences. The categories are: # Fellows – scholars resident in t ...

of the

British Academy The British Academy for the Promotion of Historical, Philosophical and Philological Studies is the United Kingdom's national academy for the humanities and the social sciences. It was established in 1902 and received its royal charter in the sa ...

*2017: Golden Plate Award of the American Academy of Achievement

Literary

*1986: PEN/Macmillan Silver Pen Award, for ''Still Life'' *1990: Booker Prize for Fiction, for ''Possession: A Romance'' *1990:

Irish Times International Fiction Prize ''The Irish Times'' is an Irish daily broadsheet newspaper and online digital publication. It was launched on 29 March 1859. The editor is Ruadhán Mac Cormaic. It is published every day except Sundays. ''The Irish Times'' is Ireland's leading n ...

, for ''Possession: A Romance'' *1991: Commonwealth Writers Prize (Eurasia Region, Best Book), for ''Possession: A Romance'' *1995: Premio Malaparte (Italy) *1995: Aga Khan Prize for Fiction, for ''The Djinn in the Nightingale's Eye'' *1998: Mythopoeic Award for Adult Literature, for ''The Djinn in the Nightingale's Eye'' *2002: Shakespeare Prize (Germany) *2009: Blue Metropolis International Literary Grand Prix *2009: Booker Prize shortlist, for ''The Children's Book'' *2010: James Tait Black Memorial Prize, for ''The Children's Book'' *2016: Erasmus Prize (Netherlands), for "exceptional contribution to literature" *2017: Park Kyong-ni Prize (South Korea) *2018: Hans Christian Andersen Literature Award (Denmark)

Memberships

* 1987–1988: Kingman Committee of Inquiry into the teaching of English Language, (Department of Education and Science) * 1984–1988: Management Committee, Society of Authors (Deputy chairman, 1986, Chairman, 1986–1988) * 1993–1998: Board, British Council (Member of Literature Advisory Panel, 1990–1998) * 2014:

American Academy of Arts and Sciences The American Academy of Arts and Sciences (The Academy) is one of the oldest learned societies in the United States. It was founded in 1780 during the American Revolution by John Adams, John Hancock, James Bowdoin, Andrew Oliver, and other ...

, Foreign Honorary Member

Works

Novels

The following books form a tetralogy known as ''The Quartet'': '' The Virgin in the Garden'' (1978), ''

'' (1985), '' Babel Tower'' (1996) and '' A Whistling Woman'' (2002). * 1964: ''Shadow of a Sun'', Chatto & Windus reprinted in 1991 with originally intended title ''The Shadow of the Sun'' * 1967: ''The Game'', Chatto & Windus * 1978: '' The Virgin in the Garden'', Chatto & Windus * 1985: ''

'', Chatto & Windus * 1990: '' Possession: A Romance'', Chatto & Windus * 1996: '' Babel Tower'', Chatto & Windus * 2000: '' The Biographer's Tale'', Chatto & Windus * 2002: '' A Whistling Woman'', Chatto & Windus * 2009: '' The Children's Book'', Chatto & Windus * 2011: '' Ragnarok: The End of the Gods'', Canongate

Short story collections

* 1987: ''Sugar and Other Stories'', Chatto & Windus * 1993: ''The Matisse Stories'', Chatto & Windus * 1994: '' The Djinn in the Nightingale's Eye'', Chatto & Windus * 1998: ''Elementals: Stories of Fire and Ice'', Chatto & Windus * 2003: ''Little Black Book of Stories'', Chatto & Windus * 2021: ''Medusa's Ankles: Selected Stories'', Chatto & Windus

Novellas

* 1992: ''Angels and Insects'', Chatto & Windus; comprises a pair of novellas: ** '' Morpho Eugenia'' ** ''The Conjugial Angel''

Essays and biographies

* 1965: ''Degrees of Freedom: The Early Novels of Iris Murdoch'', Chatto & Windus * 1970: ''Wordsworth and Coleridge in their Time'', Nelson * 1976: ''Iris Murdoch: A Critical Study'',

Longman Longman, also known as Pearson Longman, is a publisher, publishing company founded in 1724 in London, England, which is owned by Pearson PLC. Since 1968, Longman has been used primarily as an imprint by Pearson's Schools business. The Longman ...

* 1989: ''Unruly Times: Wordsworth and Coleridge, Poetry and Life'', Hogarth Press * 1991: ''Passions of the Mind: Selected Writings'', Chatto & Windus * 1995: ''Imagining Characters: Six Conversations about Women Writers'' (with Ignes Sodre), Chatto & Windus * 2000: ''On Histories and Stories: Selected Essays'', Chatto & Windus * 2001: ''Portraits in Fiction'', Chatto & Windus * 2016: ''Peacock & Vine: On William Morris and Mariano Fortuny'', Knopf * 2020: ''The Women Writers Handboook'', Aurora Metro Books

Texts edited

* 1989: ''George Eliot: Selected Essays, Poems and Other Writings'' (editor with Nicholas Warren), Penguin * 1995: ''New Writing Volume 4'' (editor with Alan Hollinghurst), Vintage * 1997: ''New Writing Volume 6'' (editor with Peter Porter), Vintage * 1998: ''Oxford Book of English Short Stories'' (editor),

Oxford University Press Oxford University Press (OUP) is the publishing house of the University of Oxford. It is the largest university press in the world. Its first book was printed in Oxford in 1478, with the Press officially granted the legal right to print books ...

* 2001: ''The Bird Hand Book'' (with photographs by Victor Schrager), Graphis Inc. (New York)

References

External links

* * * * * Audio interviews and readings * * * Download: * * {{DEFAULTSORT:Byatt, A. S. 1936 births 2023 deaths 20th-century British short story writers 20th-century English novelists 20th-century English women writers 20th-century pseudonymous writers 21st-century British short story writers 21st-century English novelists 21st-century English women writers 21st-century pseudonymous writers Academics of the Central School of Art and Design Academics of University College London Alumni of Newnham College, Cambridge Alumni of Somerville College, Oxford Booker Prize winners British women short story writers Bryn Mawr College alumni Dames Commander of the Order of the British Empire English agnostics English short story writers English women novelists Fellows of Newnham College, Cambridge Fellows of Somerville College, Oxford Fellows of the Royal Society of Literature Former Quakers The Guardian people Honorary Fellows of the British Academy The Independent people James Tait Black Memorial Prize recipients O. Henry Award winners People educated at Sheffield High School, South Yorkshire People educated at The Mount School, York People from Putney Pseudonymous women writers The Sunday Times people Writers from Sheffield