Helen de Guerry Simpson

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Helen de Guerry Simpson (born December 1, 1897 in Sydney , New South Wales , Australia ; died October 14, 1940 in Overbury , Worcestershire , England ) was an Australian writer and politician with the British Liberal Party .

Life

Helen de Guerry Simpson was born in Sydney in 1897 . Her family had settled in New South Wales more than 100 years ago . Simpson's great-grandfather, Piers Simpson RN, was related to Sir Thomas Mitchell , and her maternal grandfather, the Marquis de Lauret, settled in Goulburn some 50 years before she was born. The father, Edward Percy Simpson, was a well-known lawyer in Sydney and married to Anne de Lauret. Helen Simpson was educated at Rose Bay Convent (now Kincoppal Rose Bay, School of Sacred Heart) and Abbotsleigh, Wahroonga. In 1914 she went to France for a higher education . When the First World War broke out , she fled to England and was hired by the Admiralty to translate decoded messages. She later went to Oxford , where she studied music, but failed her bachelor's examination and then began working as a writer.

Simpson married Denis Browne , an Australian who practiced as a surgeon in London, a nephew of Thomas Alexander Browne ( Rolf Boldrewood ) in 1927

In 1940 she fell ill and underwent life-saving surgery, but died of cancer on October 14, 1940 after months of suffering. Helen and Denis Browne had a daughter, Clemence, named after the writer Clemence Dane , with whom she had written collaborations.

plant

Her first work was Philosophies in Little , a small collection of poems, published in Sydney in 1921 as a limited edition. It received little attention but was included by Percival Serle in his list of important collections Bibliography of Australasian Poetry and Verse (published 1925). The play A Man of His Time , partly in blank verse , based on the life of Benvenuto Cellini , was performed by McMahon's repertory company in Sydney and published there by Angus and Robertson in 1923. Simpson's first novel, Acquittal , was published in London in 1925, followed by The Baseless Fabric (short stories) and Cups, Wands and Swords (1927). The Women's Comedy (play) was privately printed.

Mumbudget , a collection of fairy tales, was published in 1928, followed by The Desolate House (1929) and Vantage Striker (1931). These books had comparatively little success. Helen Simpson only became successful with the Boomerang published in 1932 . This was a long, rambling novel in which the action began in Paris, at the end of the 18th century, traveled around the world, and ended in the trenches of France during World War I. It won the James Tait Black Memorial Prize for Fiction and was dramatized for radio by William Power in 1937. In 1933 The Woman on the Beast appeared , which consisted of a prologue, three books and an epilogue. The three books have no context in terms of content. There are three short novels with the same basic theme: The worst deeds are done with what appears to be the best of intentions. A historical novel, Saraband for Dead Lovers , came out in 1935, as did The Female Felon , a long short story. Saraband for Dead Lovers was the template for the film of the same name by Basil Dearden in 1948 .

In addition to the books already mentioned, Simpson was the author of two historical biographies, The Spanish Marriage (1933) and Henry VIII (1934). The Happy Housewife , a book on household management, was published in 1934. A Woman Among Wild Men , an account of the life of Mary Kingsley , was published in 1938. The Waiting City , which appeared in 1933, is her translation of a selection from Louis Sebastien Mercier's Le Tableau de Paris . She wrote three novels, Enter Sir John (1929), Printers Devil (1930) and Re-enter Sir John (1932) together with Clemence Dane. Enter Sir John was filmed as Murder! (1930) by Alfred Hitchcock , who later also filmed Under Capricorn (1949). Helen Simpson also wrote parts of the dialogue for Hitchcock's film Sabotage (1936).

In 1937 Simpson went to Australia to work for the Australian Broadcasting Corporation . She gave a number of lectures and collected material for her novel Under Capricorn , which was published in 1937 and set 100 years earlier in Sydney. Her last novel, Maid No More , was published in 1940.

politics

In 1939 she was nominated by the Isle of Wight Liberal Association as their candidate for parliament in the general election . The seat was held by the Conservatives, but the Liberals were expected to go to great lengths to regain the seat they had last won in 1923. Simpson attended the 1937 meeting of the Liberal Party in Scarborough and toured England as a speaker for her party.

Publications

Novels

  • Acquittal (1925)
  • Cups, Wands and Swords (1927)
  • Enter Sir John with Clemence Dane (1928)
  • The Desolate House (1929)
  • Author Unknown with Clemence Dane (1930)
  • Vantage Striker (1931)
  • Boomerang (1932)
  • Re-Enter Sir John with Clemence Dane (1932)
  • The Woman on the Beast: Viewed from Three Angles (1933)
  • Saraband for Dead Lovers (1935)
  • The Female Felon (1935)
  • Under Capricorn (1937)
  • Maid No More (1940)

Collections

  • Philosophies in Little (1921) poems
  • The Baseless Fabric (1925) short stories
  • Mumbudget (1928) fairy tale
  • Heartsease and Honesty: Being the Pastimes of the Sieur de Grammont (1935) translation

Biographies

  • The Spanish marriage (1933)
  • Henry VIII (1934)

Plays

  • A Man of His Time: A Play (1923)
  • For One Act Plays (1923)
  • The Women's Comedy (1926)

literature

Web links

Remarks

  1. ↑ The Sydney Morning Herald: Miss Helen Simpson in Australia ; accessed February 1, 2016.
  2. ^ A b c Alan Roberts: Simpson, Helen de Guerry . In: Australian Dictionary of Biography , Volume 11, MUP 1988, accessed December 9, 2015.
  3. ^ Famous Novel Dramatised for Radio . In: The Australian Women's Weekly , National Library of Australia, August 21, 1937, p. 37. Retrieved February 1, 2016. 
personal data
SURNAME Simpson, Helen de Guerry
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Simpson, Helen; Browne, Helen de Guerry
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Australian writer; British Liberal Party politician
DATE OF BIRTH December 1, 1897
PLACE OF BIRTH Sydney , Australia
DATE OF DEATH October 14, 1940
Place of death Overbury , England