Overview

It is no surprise that one of Muriel Spark's most lively and entertaining works would be her own memoir, Curriculum Vitae. Born to a Scottish Jewish father and an English Presbyterian mother, Spark describes her childhood in 1930s Edinburgh in brief, dazzling anecdotes. In one she recalls a cherished schoolteacher, Christina Kay, who would later be used as the prototype for Miss Jean Brodie. Spark boldly details her disastrous first marriage to Sydney Oswald Spark (S.O.S.) - himself thirty-two, she just nineteen - whom she followed to Rhodesia (now Zimbabwe) and left behind to return to England. In the midst of WWII, Spark took a bizarre position working in the disinformation campaign of the British Secret Service, eliciting information from German POWs to combat Nazi propaganda. She later moved to the Poetry Society of London, where she mingled with literati and other intellectuals, befriended by some (such as Graham Greene, an early supporter of her work) and sparring with others. We experience Spark's joy with the publication of her first novel, The Comforters, her trials with other writers' envy, and her emergence as the most brilliant femme fatale of 20th-century English literature.

Full Product Details

9780811219235

Table of Contents

Reviews

Tantalizing. -- The New York Times Spark's enchanting memoir flickers with the tart judgments, gimlet wit, bizarre episodes and odd twists of fate that distinguish her fiction. -- Publishers Weekly What a writer Spark is - odd, funny, aphoristic, wise, and technically brilliant. -- Nick Hornby - The Believer

Tantalizing.

What a writer Spark is odd, funny, aphoristic, wise, and technically brilliant. --Nick Hornby

Author Information

The writer of ""some of the best sentences in English"" (The New Yorker), Muriel Spark (1918-2006) was the author of dozens of novels including The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie, Memento Mori, and The Driver's Seat. She became Dame Commander of the Order of the British Empire in 1993.

Tab Content 6

Customer Reviews

Recent Reviews

Countries Available