Naomi Mitchison

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Bust of Naomi Mitchison in South Gyle, Edinburgh, Scotland

Naomi Mitchison ; born Naomi May Margaret Haldane (born November 1, 1897 in Edinburgh , † January 11, 1999 in Carradale near Campbeltown , Scotland ) was a British writer who wrote historical , science fiction and fantasy novels.

Life

Naomi Mitchison was the daughter of John Scott Haldane , Professor of Physiology at Oxford , and Louisa Kathleen Trotter. Her brother was JBS Haldane , a theoretical biologist and geneticist , one of the founders of population genetics . Her uncle was the politician and two-time Lord Chancellor Richard Haldane .

She went to school in Oxford and then took a break from studying at the University of Oxford to volunteer as a nurse during World War I. After contracting scarlet fever , she completed her distance learning education at St Anne's College . In 1916 she married Gilbert Mitchison , who later became a well-known politician. The marriage resulted in seven children, two of whom died early (daughter Clemency in 1940 shortly after her birth, eldest son Geoffrey in 1927 at the age of nine from meningitis ). The zoologists Avrion Mitchison and Murdoch Mitchison are her sons.

She remained active into old age and died at her estate in Scotland, 101 years old.

plant

Mitchison was a prolific writer and published around ninety books of various genres. She began to work through her war experiences in The Conquered , a novel about Caesar's conquest of Gaul , and then continued to devote herself to historical novels, including ancient Rome and Hellenistic Greece. But she also wrote children's books, fantasy (including To The Chapel Perilous, an idiosyncratic adaptation of the Arthurian material) and science fiction. With the latter in particular, she caused a sensation because she openly represented feminist positions in Memoirs Of A Spacewoman and had already addressed sexuality in an unusually open manner with We Have Been Warned in 1935 (the book was often rejected and rewritten, later also censored) . She was friends with JRR Tolkien and read the manuscript of The Lord of the Rings Correction. Her books about Africa go back to an encounter with the heir to the throne of the Bakgatla from Botswana , whom she got to know at one of her tea parties ; she traveled to Africa several times and received the title of mother of the Bakgatla in 1963.

bibliography

Novels
  • The Conquered (1923)
    • German: Beyond Victory. Translated by Ursula Clemen. 1952.
  • When the Bough Breaks and Other Stories (1924)
  • Cloud Cuckoo Land (1925)
  • The Laburnum Branch (1926)
  • The Fairy Who Couldn't Tell A Lie (1927)
  • Anna Comnena (1928)
  • Black Sparta (1928)
  • Nix-Nought-Nothing (1928)
  • Barbarian Stories (1929)
  • The Hostages, and Other Stories for Boys and Girls (1930)
  • The Corn King and the Spring Queen (1931)
    • German: Kornkönig and spring bride. Translated by Annette Charpentier. 1985.
  • Boys And Girls And Gods (1931)
  • The Prince of Freedom (1931)
  • Powers Of Light (1932)
  • The Delicate Fire (1933)
  • We Have Been Warned (1935)
  • The Fourth Pit (1936)
  • An End And A Beginning (1937)
  • The Blood Of The Martyrs (1939)
  • The Bull Calves (1947)
  • The Big House (1950)
  • Travel Light (1952)
    • German: A journey through time. Translated by Manfred Ohl and Hans Sartorius. 1987.
  • Graeme and the Dragon (1954)
  • The Land the Ravens Found (1955)
  • To The Chapel Perilous (1955)
    • English: King Arthur sends his regards. Translated by Annette von Charpentier. 1986.
  • Little Boxes (1956)
  • Behold your King (1957)
  • The Young Alexander the Great (1960)
  • Memoirs Of A Spacewoman (1962)
    • English: Memoirs of a Spaceman. Translated by Rosemarie Hundertmarck. 1980.
  • Ketse And The Chief (1965)
  • Friends And Enemies (1966)
  • Big Surprise (1967)
  • Family At Ditlabeng (1969)
  • Don't Look Back (1969)
  • Far Harbor (1969)
  • Sun and Moon (1970)
  • Cleopatra's People (1972)
    • German: Cleopatra's children. Translated by Brigitte Beyer and Helmut W. Pesch . 1987.
  • Sunrise Tomorrow: A Story Of Botswana (1973)
  • A Life for Africa: The Story of Bram Fischer (1973)
  • Danish Teapot (1973)
  • Oil For The Highlands? (1974)
  • Solution Three (1975)
    • German: Solution three. Translated by Peter Robert. 1984.
  • All Change Here (1975)
  • Snake! (1976)
  • Two Magicians (1979, with Dick Mitchison)
  • The Vegetable War (1980)
  • Mucking Around (1981)
  • Not By Bread Alone (1983)
  • Early In Orcadia (1987)
  • Images Of Africa (1987)
    • German: Stories from Africa. Translated by Annette von Charpentier. 1986.
  • As It Was (1988)
  • The Oath-Takers (1991)
  • Sea-Green Ribbons (1991)
  • The Dark Twin (1998, with Marion Campbell)
Autobiography
  • Small talk. Memories of an Edwardian Childhood (1973)
  • All change here. Girlhood and Marriage (1975)
  • You May Well Ask. A Memoir, 1920-1940 (1979)
  • Mucking Around (1981)
  • Among You Taking Notes. The Wartime Diary of Naomi Mitchison (1986)
theatre
  • Nix-Nought-Nothing: Four Plays for Children (contains My Ain Sel ', Hobyahf Hobyahl, Elfen Hill ; 1928)
  • Kate Crackernuts: A Fairy Play (1931)
  • The Price of Freedom (with Lewis Gielgud, 1931, premiered in 1949)
  • Full Fathom Five (with Lewis Gielgud, 1931, premiered in 1932)
  • An End and a Beginning and Other Plays (contains The City and the Citizens, For This Man Is a Roman, In the Time of Constantine, Wild Men Invade the Roman Empire, Charlemagne and His Court, The Thing That is Plain, Cortez in Mexico , Akbar, But Still It Moves, The New Calendar, American Britons ; 1937, also as Historical Plays for Schools , 1939)
  • As It Was in the Beginning (with Lewis Gielgud, 1939)
  • The Com King (music by Brian Easdale , adaptation of the Mitchison novel, premiered in 1950)
  • Spindrift (with Denis Macintosh, first performed 1951)
Collections
  • When the Bough Breaks and Other Stories (1924)
  • The Laburnum Branch (1926)
  • Black Sparta (1928)
  • Barbarian Stories (1929)
  • Beyond This Limit: Selected Shorter Fiction of Naomi Mitchison (1935)
  • The Fourth Pig (1936)
  • Five Men and a Swan (1957)
  • The Brave Nurse: And Other Stories (1977)
  • Cleansing of the Knife: And Other Poems (1979, poems)
  • What Do You Think Yourself: and Other Scottish Short Stories (1982)
  • A Girl Must Live: Stories and Poems (1990, poems)
Non-fiction
  • Vienna Diary (19349)
  • The Moral Basis of Politics (1938)
  • Return to the Fairy Hill (1966)
  • African Heroes (1968)
  • The Africans: From the Earliest Times to the Present (1971)
  • A Life for Africa: The Story of Bram Fischer (1973)
  • Oil for the Highlands? (1974)
  • Margaret Cole, 1893-1980 (1982)
  • Rising Public Voice: Women in Politics Worldwide (1995)
  • Essays and Journalism. Volume 2: Carradale (2009)

literature

Biographies
Lexicons

Web links

personal data
SURNAME Mitchison, Naomi
BRIEF DESCRIPTION British science fiction and fantasy writer
DATE OF BIRTH November 1, 1897
PLACE OF BIRTH Edinburgh
DATE OF DEATH January 11, 1999
Place of death Carradale