Carcanet Press - Muriel Spark (1918

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Muriel Spark was born in Edinburgh in 1918. After some years living in Africa, she returned to England, where she edited Poetry Review from 1947 to 1949 and published her first volume of poems, The Fanfarlo, in 1952. She eventually made her home in Italy. Her many novels include Memento Mori (1959), The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie (1961), The Girls of Slender Means (1963), The Abbess of Crewe (1974), A Far Cry from Kensington (1988) and The Finishing School (2004). Her short stories were collected in 1967, 1985 and 2001, and her Collected Poems appeared in 1967. Dame Muriel was made Commandeur des Arts et des Lettres (France) in 1996 and awarded her DBE in 1993. She died in Italy on 13th April 2006, at the age of 88.

The National Library of Scotland holds the Muriel Spark archive: visit www.nls.uk/murielspark/ for more information.

Praise for Muriel Spark (1918 - 2006) The marvellous thing about Muriel Spark's writing is that...it never gets knotted up in its own so-sharp-she'll-cut-herself cleverness. Spark's writing has a subtle merriment about it, a lightness of touch, a willingness to share in fleeting moments of mundane love and pleasure.
- Jenny Turner, London Review of Books
Like all her work, surprising, beautifully written, and with unnerving glimpses into the abyss which lies, always, beneath our feet.
- John Mortimer, Evening Standard

'Muriel Spark's biography of Mary Shelley keeps its focus on the woman herself and refuses to be distracted by the celebrities in her life'. read more

'I have always disliked the sort of biography which states ''X lay on the bed and watched the candle flickering on the roof beams'' when there is no evidence X did so,' states Muriel Spark in the introduction to her study of Mary Shelley, originally published in 1951 and reissued here in a revised version. read more

Discussing why she kept her married name despite enduring just two disastrous years in Africa with her husband and his 'mental problems', the former Miss Muriel Camberg explains: 'Spark seemed to have some ingredient of life and of fun'. read more

First published in 1992 and reissued after the publication, earlier this year, of Martin Stannard's definitive biography, Spark's account of her youth - the work ends in 1954 - is as tantalisingly evasive and full of contradictions as any of her novels. read more

The reprinting of Spark's autobiography, which charts the writer's life from her childhood in Edinburgh, through to her disastrous marriage in Kenya, the birth of her son and working days in publishing in London, comes with a new introduction by poet Elaine Feinstein, who didn't know Spark well, but who understands this 'sly, tantalising account of her life'.� read more

As a novelist Muriel Spark produced a body of work that is as notable for its intellectual vigour as for its clarity and wit. read more

Who hasn't thrilled to the all-female worlds of Miss Jean Brodie's creme de la creme and the May of Teck Club in The Girls of Slender Means ?� read more

Curriculum Vitae by Muriel Spark (Carcanet, £8.99) read more

Curriculum Vitae: A Volume of Autobiography by Muriel Spark, Carcanet Press Ltd, £8.99 read more

Elaine Feinstein, Poetry Review Volume 96:3 Autumn 2006 �Swept, Emptied, Kept
��Muriel Spark is a novelist of genius - elegant, elliptical, endlessly inventive - who began to publish early as a poet and continued to write poetry all her life. read more

Ian Sansom, The Guardian , Saturday 11th December 2004
All in the dinkety details:
Ian Sansom admires the sharp intelligence and wry wit of Muriel Spark's Collected Poems
In 1932 a certain Muriel Camberg, of James Gillespie's Girls' School in Edinburgh, was crowned at the Scottish Ideal Home Exhibition, for the best poem commemorating the death of Sir Walter Scott. read more

Herbert Lomas, AMBIT magazine
'...I read more

Susan Eilenberg, The London Review of Books :
In her voice reverberate the voices of others (Blake, Tennyson, Yeats, Eliot, Coleridge), sometimes to grotesque ('The new moon like a pair of surgical forceps/With the old moon in her jaws'), and sometimes to lyrical effect. read more

Reviewed by Sean O'Brien in The Sunday Times , 14 November 2004-11-16
Muriel Spark is among our most distinguished novelists. read more

Reviewed in The Times
Spark aficionados will discover in her poems seeds of the same unsentimental vision of human folly, the same forceful honesty, offbeat glamour, spare authority of style, and surreal wit they find in her novels. read more

Editor's Choice in the Philadelphia Inquirer
The poetic underpinnings of the fiction and the close attention to form are evident throughout this collection. read more

Reviewed in the Financial Times
Muriel Spark is so well-known and well-loved as a novelist that her poetry has almost inevitably been eclipsed. read more

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Muriel Spark (1918 - 2006) Books by this author: Mary Shelley Curriculum Vitae All the Poems About Reviews Muriel Spark was born in Edinburgh in 1918. After some years living in Africa, she returned to England, where she edited Poetry Review from 1947 to 1949 and published her first volume of poems, The Fanfarlo, in 1952. She eventually made her home in Italy. Her many novels include Memento Mori (1959), The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie (1961), The Girls of Slender Means (1963), The Abbess of Crewe (1974), A Far Cry from Kensington (1988) and The Finishing School (2004). Her short stories were collected in 1967, 1985 and 2001, and her Collected Poems appeared in 1967. Dame Muriel was made Commandeur des Arts et des Lettres (France) in 1996 and awarded her DBE in 1993. She died in Italy on 13th April 2006, at the age of 88. The National Library of Scotland holds the Muriel Spark archive: visit www.nls.uk/murielspark/ for more information. Praise for Muriel Spark (1918 - 2006) The marvellous thing about Muriel Spark's writing is that...it never gets knotted up in its own so-sharp-she'll-cut-herself cleverness. Spark's writing has a subtle merriment about it, a lightness of touch, a willingness to share in fleeting moments of mundane love and pleasure. - Jenny Turner, London Review of Books Like all her work, surprising, beautifully written, and with unnerving glimpses into the abyss which lies, always, beneath our feet. - John Mortimer, Evening Standard 'Muriel Spark's biography of Mary Shelley keeps its focus on the woman herself and refuses to be distracted by the celebrities in her life'. read more 'I have always disliked the sort of biography which states ''X lay on the bed and watched the candle flickering on the roof beams'' when there is no evidence X did so,' states Muriel Spark in the introduction to her study of Mary Shelley, originally published in 1951 and reissued here in a revised version. read more Discussing why she kept her married name despite enduring just two disastrous years in Africa with her husband and his 'mental problems', the former Miss Muriel Camberg explains: 'Spark seemed to have some ingredient of life and of fun'. read more First published in 1992 and reissued after the publication, earlier this year, of Martin Stannard's definitive biography, Spark's account of her youth - the work ends in 1954 - is as tantalisingly evasive and full of contradictions as any of her novels. read more The reprinting of Spark's autobiography, which charts the writer's life from her childhood in Edinburgh, through to her disastrous marriage in Kenya, the birth of her son and working days in publishing in London, comes with a new introduction by poet Elaine Feinstein, who didn't know Spark well, but who understands this 'sly, tantalising account of her life'.� read more As a novelist Muriel Spark produced a body of work that is as notable for its intellectual vigour as for its clarity and wit. read more Who hasn't thrilled to the all-female worlds of Miss Jean Brodie's creme de la creme and the May of Teck Club in The Girls of Slender Means ?� read more Curriculum Vitae by Muriel Spark (Carcanet, £8.99) read more Curriculum Vitae: A Volume of Autobiography by Muriel Spark, Carcanet Press Ltd, £8.99 read more Elaine Feinstein, Poetry Review Volume 96:3 Autumn 2006 �Swept, Emptied, Kept ��Muriel Spark is a novelist of genius - elegant, elliptical, endlessly inventive - who began to publish early as a poet and continued to write poetry all her life. read more Ian Sansom, The Guardian , Saturday 11th December 2004 All in the dinkety details: Ian Sansom admires the sharp intelligence and wry wit of Muriel Spark's Collected Poems In 1932 a certain Muriel Camberg, of James Gillespie's Girls' School in Edinburgh, was crowned at the Scottish Ideal Home Exhibition, for the best poem commemorating the death of Sir Walter Scott. read more Herbert Lomas, AMBIT magazine '...I read more Ian Sansom, The Guardian , Saturday 11th December 2004 All in the dinkety details: Ian Sansom admires the sharp intelligence and wry wit of Muriel Spark's Collected Poems In 1932 a certain Muriel Camberg, of James Gillespie's Girls' School in Edinburgh, was crowned at the Scottish Ideal Home Exhibition, for the best poem commemorating the death of Sir Walter Scott. read more Susan Eilenberg, The London Review of Books : In her voice reverberate the voices of others (Blake, Tennyson, Yeats, Eliot, Coleridge), sometimes to grotesque ('The new moon like a pair of surgical forceps/With the old moon in her jaws'), and sometimes to lyrical effect. read more Reviewed by Sean O'Brien in The Sunday Times , 14 November 2004-11-16 Muriel Spark is among our most distinguished novelists. read more Reviewed in The Times Spark aficionados will discover in her poems seeds of the same unsentimental vision of human folly, the same forceful honesty, offbeat glamour, spare authority of style, and surreal wit they find in her novels. read more Editor's Choice in the Philadelphia Inquirer The poetic underpinnings of the fiction and the close attention to form are evident throughout this collection. read more Reviewed in the Financial Times Muriel Spark is so well-known and well-loved as a novelist that her poetry has almost inevitably been eclipsed. read more	Share this... 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