Elisabeth Kyle

Last updated

Agnes Mary Robertson Dunlop
BornAgnes Mary Robertson Dunlop
Ayr [1]
Pen nameElisabeth Kyle
Jan Ralston
Mary Forsyth
OccupationAuthor
NationalityBritish
Period1930–1980
GenreJournalism
novels
children's books

Elisabeth Kyle, pseudonym of Agnes Mary Robertson Dunlop, (born 1 January 1901, died 23 February 1982), was a Scottish journalist and writer of novels, children's books and travel literature. [2]

Contents

She used the pen name Jan Ralston for publication of one of her books in the United States. Some of her journalism was published under the name Mary Forsyth. [3]

Biography

Agnes Mary Robertson Dunlop was born in Ayr, Scotland on 1 January 1901. Her mother was Elizabeth Riddell Dunlop and her father was James Dunlop, a lawyer in the family firm.[ citation needed ] He was keen on literature, introducing his daughter to the classics and monitoring the books to which she was exposed. He died when she was nine years old.

As a child she had no particular intention of becoming an author, and when she finished her education became a journalist, first with the Manchester Guardian and then with the Glasgow Herald . Her journalism includes articles about other Scottish women writers such as Mary Cleland and Nan Shepherd. [2] She wrote the regular "Ways of Women" column in the Nottingham Evening Post in the 1930s. [4]

Kyle's earliest published works were stories in children's annuals. [5] [ better source needed ] A large part of her output was books for children, published between the 1930s and 1980. [6] Many of these were historical novels designed for a young audience, with heroines such as Charlotte Brontë, Mary II of England, Florence Nightingale and Clara Schumann. [6] She wrote several novels for adults, including The Begonia Bed (1934), The Pleasure Dome (1943), The Tontine Belle (1951), and The Other Miss Evans (1958). [6] [ better source needed ]

She gave radio talks and wrote radio plays for children and adults. [1] [7] One of her novels for adults, The Regent's Candlesticks (1954), was broadcast on the BBC Light Programme as Book at Bedtime in 1995. [7] [8] She also adapted other books for radio, such as Neil Munro's The Daft Days in 1937. [9] In 1939 she was described in the Berwickshire News and General Advertiser as "well known as a writer for Children’s Hour, particularly in the adaptations she has made of folk tales". [10] Her first radio talk was given on Yugoslavia and was in 1941. [11]

Kyle travelled extensively; at the time of the publication of her first novel in 1934 she was said in the Nottingham Evening Press, to have travelled around Scandinavia by "tramp steamer", and to "know the Balkan States and their people more or less intimately". [12] The Liverpool Post in the same year described her as "wander[ing] about Europe and America in a more or less vagabond way in order to stisfy her craving for adventure". [13]

Dunlop was a friend of Josephine Tey and corresponded with her. [14]

Bibliography

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Peneus</span> Thessalian river god

In Greek mythology, Peneus was a Thessalian river god, one of the three thousand Rivers (Potamoi), a child of Oceanus and Tethys.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">J. M. Barrie</span> British novelist and playwright (1860–1937)

Sir James Matthew Barrie, 1st Baronet, was a Scottish novelist and playwright, best remembered as the creator of Peter Pan. He was born and educated in Scotland and then moved to London, where he wrote several successful novels and plays. There he met the Llewelyn Davies boys, who inspired him to write about a baby boy who has magical adventures in Kensington Gardens, then to write Peter Pan, or The Boy Who Wouldn't Grow Up, a 1904 West End "fairy play" about an ageless boy and an ordinary girl named Wendy who have adventures in the fantasy setting of Neverland.

<i>The Secret Garden</i> 1911 novel by Frances Hodgson Burnett

The Secret Garden is a novel by Frances Hodgson Burnett first published in book form in 1911, after serialisation in The American Magazine. Set in England, it is one of Burnett's most popular novels and seen as a classic of English children's literature. Several stage and film adaptations have been made. The American edition was published by the Frederick A. Stokes Company with illustrations by Maria Louise Kirk and the British edition by Heinemann with illustrations by Charles Heath Robinson.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Penelope Lively</span> British novelist (born 1933)

Dame Penelope Margaret Lively is a British writer of fiction for both children and adults. Lively has won both the Booker Prize and the Carnegie Medal for British children's books.

<i>Adam Bede</i> 1859 novel by George Eliot

Adam Bede was the first novel by Mary Ann Evans, and was published in 1859. It was published pseudonymously, even though Evans was a well-published and highly respected scholar of her time. The novel has remained in print ever since and is regularly used in university studies of 19th-century English literature. She described the novel as "a country story full of the breath of cows and scent of hay".

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Jill Paton Walsh</span> English author (1937—2020)

Gillian Honorine Mary Herbert, Baroness Hemingford,, known professionally as Jill Paton Walsh, was an English novelist and children's writer. She may be known best for her Booker Prize-nominated novel Knowledge of Angels and for the Peter Wimsey–Harriet Vane mysteries that continued the work of Dorothy L. Sayers.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Daniel O. Fagunwa</span> Nigerian author

Chief Daniel Olorunfẹmi Fágúnwà MBE, popularly known as D. O. Fágúnwà, was a Nigerian author of Yorùbá heritage who pioneered the Yorùbá language novel.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Sarah Millin</span> South African author (1889–1968)

Sarah Gertrude Millin, née Liebson, was a South African author.

Marcus Sedgwick was a British writer and illustrator. He authored several young adult and children's books and picture books, a work of nonfiction and several novels for adults, and illustrated a collection of myths and a book of folk tales for adults. According to School Library Journal his "most acclaimed titles" were those for young adults.

Barbara Euphan Todd was an English writer widely remembered for her ten books for children about a scarecrow called Worzel Gummidge. These were adapted for radio and television. The title story was chosen as the first in the new publisher's series Puffin Books.

<i>Peter Pan in Kensington Gardens</i> 1906 novel by J. M. Barrie

Peter Pan in Kensington Gardens is a novel by J. M. Barrie, illustrated by Arthur Rackham, and published by Hodder & Stoughton in late November or early December 1906; it is one of four major literary works by Barrie featuring the widely known literary character he created, Peter Pan. Most of the text originally appeared as chapters 13–18 of Barrie's 1902 novel The Little White Bird.

<i>Peter and Wendy</i> Book and play by J. M. Barrie

Peter Pan; or, the Boy Who Wouldn't Grow Up, often known simply as Peter Pan, is a work by J. M. Barrie, in the form of a 1904 play and a 1911 novel titled Peter and Wendy, often extended in Peter Pan and Wendy. Both versions tell the story of Peter Pan, a mischievous little boy who can fly, and has many adventures on the island of Neverland that is inhabited by mermaids, fairies, "Indians" (American-Indians), and pirates. The Peter Pan stories also involve the characters Wendy Darling and her two brothers John and Michael, Peter's fairy Tinker Bell, the Lost Boys, and the pirate Captain Hook. The play and novel were inspired by Barrie's friendship with the Llewelyn Davies family. Barrie continued to revise the play for years after its debut until publication of the play script in 1928.

<i>We Couldnt Leave Dinah</i>

We Couldn't Leave Dinah is a children's novel by Mary Treadgold, first published by Jonathan Cape in 1941 with illustrations by Stuart Tresilian. It is a contemporary adventure story set on a fictional island in the English Channel during World War II and eventually during a German occupation. Treadgold won the 1941 Carnegie Medal recognising the year's outstanding children's book.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Mary Angela Dickens</span> Grandchild of Victorian-era novelist Charles Dickens

Mary Angela Dickens was an English novelist and journalist of the late Victorian and Edwardian eras, and the oldest grandchild of the novelist Charles Dickens. She died on the 136th anniversary of her grandfather's birth.

Irma Chilton, also known as I. M. Chilton, was a Welsh children's writer in the English and Welsh languages. She was a recipient of the Tir na n-Og Award presented by the Welsh Books Council, and of eisteddfod prizes.

Nora Lavrin, néeFry, was an English engraver, book illustrator and painter. She illustrated twenty editions of children's books.

Locksmith Animation Ltd. is a British CGI animation film studio founded by Aardman Animations collaborators Sarah Smith and Julie Lockhart with the financial backing of Elisabeth Murdoch on March 5, 2014. Based in London, England, Locksmith bills itself as "the only high-end CGI animation film studio in the United Kingdom, making CGI-animated family films which are all made for kids and adults of all ages."

Pauline Cartwright is a writer of novels, picture books, stories and poems for children. She was awarded the Choysa Bursary in 1991 and the University of Otago College of Education / Creative New Zealand Children's Writer in Residence Fellowship in 2003. She lives in Alexandra, New Zealand.

Averil Constance Demuth (1906–2000) was an English writer of children's stories, several of which have a fantasy element.

References

  1. 1 2 Young Wings. 1954. Retrieved 11 January 2023.
  2. 1 2 Gifford, D. (2020). History of Scottish Women's Writing. Edinburgh University Press. p. 369. ISBN   978-0-7486-7266-0 . Retrieved 11 January 2023.
  3. "An Edinburgh Chronicle. "Mary Forsyth"". Edinburgh Evening News. 11 July 1939. Retrieved 19 January 2023. Mary Forsyth" is the pen-name of Miss Agnes Dunlop, of Ayr, who is also well known under the pseudonym, "Elisabeth Kyle
  4. Kyle, Elisabeth (2 December 1933). "The Ways of Women". Nottingham Evening Post. Retrieved 19 January 2023.
  5. "Princess of Orange". BookRags. Retrieved 20 November 2019.
  6. 1 2 3 "Elisabeth Kyle (1901–1982)". Lesser-known British, Irish, & American women writers 1910–1960. Furrowed Middlebrow. January 2014. Retrieved 20 November 2019.
  7. 1 2 "Elisabeth Kyle". The Genome Project. BBC. Retrieved 11 January 2023.
  8. "A Book at Bedtime". The Television & Radio Database. Retrieved 11 January 2023.
  9. "Broadcasting News. Neil Munro's "The Daft Days" - October 11". Leven Advertiser & Wemyss Gazette. 28 September 1937. Retrieved 19 January 2023. Neil Munro's famous novel, The Daft Days. which has been adapted for the microphone by Elisabeth Kyle, a well-known Scottish journalist
  10. "Some Broadcasts to Come". Berwickshire News and General Advertiser. 5 December 1939. Retrieved 19 January 2023.
  11. "Broadcasting. Slavs and their Country". Berwick Advertiser. 17 April 1941. Retrieved 19 January 2023. Listeners to Children's Hour will remember the many plays which she has written for young listeners, but her broadcast on April 26, will mark her first personal appearance at the microphone
  12. "Echoes from Town: New Authoress". Nottingham Evening Post. 6 March 1934. Retrieved 19 January 2023.
  13. "A London Letter for Women". Liverpool Daily Post. 12 March 1934. Retrieved 19 January 2023.
  14. Henderson, J.M.; McDermid, V. (2021). Josephine Tey: A Life. Sandstone Press Limited. p. 455. ISBN   978-1-914518-08-9 . Retrieved 11 January 2023.
  15. 1 2 Edwards, O.D. (2007). British Children's Fiction in the Second World War. Societies at War. Edinburgh University Press. p. 637. ISBN   978-0-7486-2872-8 . Retrieved 11 January 2023.
  16. Slovak Review. Slovak Akademic Press. 1992. ISSN   1335-0544 . Retrieved 11 January 2023.
  17. The Living Church. Morehouse-Gorham Company. 1955. p. 17-PA26. Retrieved 11 January 2023.