Mary Warburton Sandbach (born Mary Warburton Matthews; 25 April 1901 – 3 November 1990) was a

British British may refer to: Peoples, culture, and language * British people, nationals or natives of the United Kingdom, British Overseas Territories and Crown Dependencies. * British national identity, the characteristics of British people and culture ...

translator. She is noted for her translations of the Swedish writer

August Strindberg Johan August Strindberg (; ; 22 January 184914 May 1912) was a Swedish playwright, novelist, poet, essayist, and painter.Lane (1998), 1040. A prolific writer who often drew directly on his personal experience, Strindberg wrote more than 60 pla ...

Life

Sandbach was born in

Edgbaston Edgbaston () is a suburb of Birmingham, West Midlands (county), West Midlands, England. It lies immediately south-west of Birmingham city centre, and was historically in Warwickshire. The Ward (electoral subdivision), wards of Edgbaston and Nort ...

in 1901. Her parents were Miriam (born Warburton) and Arthur Daniel Mathews. Her father was a foundry owner who went bankrupt. She experimented with attending

Edgbaston High School for Girls Edgbaston High School for Girls is a private day school for girls aged 2 to 18 in the Edgbaston area of Birmingham, England. History In 1846, Elizabeth Brady founded a school in Edgbaston for the daughters of Quakers in 1846 and this ran for 21 ...

but she preferred to be home educated by her mother. She was not considered academic, unlike her sister, who went to attend

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 Millicen ...

, Cambridge. Mary had no formal educational qualifications. In 1922 she began her interest in Scandinavia when she set out to be an

au pair An au pair (; : au pairs) is a person working for, and living as part of, a homestay, host family. Typically, au pairs take on a share of the family’s responsibility for child care as well as some homemaking, housework, and receive a monetary ...

there. This was her second choice as her skill with the violin had failed to get her a place at the Royal School of Music. She was there for a year; in 1925 she returned, and spent four years in Sweden. She returned to Birmingham where she studied speech therapy and she volunteered to assist in prisons. She married Francis Henry (Harry) Sandbach 1932; in the 1940s, they had a daughter and a son. By the outbreak of 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 ...

she lived Harry in Cambridge, where he was a professor of

classics Classics, also classical studies or Ancient Greek and Roman studies, is the study of classical antiquity. In the Western world, ''classics'' traditionally refers to the study of Ancient Greek literature, Ancient Greek and Roman literature and ...

. They were both employed by the Admiralty and she worked in intelligence reading the Norwegian press. In 1940 she published her first book, drawing on her experience in Iceland which she had visited after the death of their first child in the 1930s. Sandbach was given an early commission by the

Swedish Institute The Swedish Institute (, ) is a government agency in Sweden with the responsibility to spread information about Sweden outside the country. It exists to promote Swedish interests, and to organise exchanges with other countries in different ar ...

to translate future Nobel Laureate Eyvind Johnson's novel ''1914'' into English. She translated the work and assisted with placing the book with a publisher. She became known for her translations from the Scandinavian languages of Danish, Swedish and Norwegian. She was noted for her translations of the works of

. August Strindberg is known for his innovative style in Swedish and Sandbach, terse style in English is thought to be a good approach. Her Strindberg translations include ''Inferno'', ''Getting Married'' and ''From an Occult Diary''. Sandbach died in 1990 in

Cambridge Cambridge ( ) is a List of cities in the United Kingdom, city and non-metropolitan district in the county of Cambridgeshire, England. It is the county town of Cambridgeshire and is located on the River Cam, north of London. As of the 2021 Unit ...

Translations

* ''1914'' by Eyvind Johnson (1970) * ''Getting Married,'' Parts I and II, by

, 1972

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Sandbach, Mary 1901 births 1990 deaths People from Edgbaston Translators from Norwegian Translators from Danish Translators from Swedish