Mary Lady Stewart (born Mary Florence Elinor Rainbow; 17 September 1916-9 May 2014) was a British novelist who developed the romantic mystery genre, featuring smart, adventurous heroines who could hold their own in dangerous situations.
She also wrote children's books and poetry, but may be best known for her Merlin series, which straddles the boundary between the historical novel and fantasy.
Mary Stewart was born on 17 September 1916 in Sunderland, County Durham, England, daughter of Mary Edith Matthews, from New Zealand, and Frederick Albert Rainbow, a vicar.
She graduated from Durham University in 1938 with first-class honours in English, was awarded a first-class Teaching Diploma in English with Art the following year and in 1941 gained her master's degree.
The scarcity of jobs during World War II meant that she held a variety of posts during this period, including primary school teaching, teaching at secondary level at a girls' boarding school, and working part-time both at the Sixth Form of Durham School and as a temporary lecturer in the English Department at Durham University. She received an honorary D.Litt. in 2009.
It was in Durham that she met and married her husband, Frederick Stewart, a young Scot who lectured in Geology. They married in September 1945 after having met at a VE Day dance; their engagement was announced in The Times only one month after they met. At 30, she suffered an ectopic pregnancy, undiagnosed for several weeks, and subsequently could not have children.
More information: Archive I & II
In 1956, they moved to Edinburgh, where he became professor of geology and mineralogy, and later chairman of the Geology Department at University of Edinburgh.
Mary, in her own words, was a born storyteller and had been writing stories since the age of three. When she and her husband moved to Edinburgh, she submitted a novel to the publishers Hodder & Stoughton. Madam, Will You Talk? was an immediate success, followed by many other successful works over the years.
In 1974, Mary's husband Frederick Stewart was knighted and she became Lady Stewart, although she never used the title. Her husband died in 2001.
In semi-retirement Stewart resided in Edinburgh, Scotland as well as Loch Awe, Scotland. An avid gardener, Mary and her husband shared a keen love of nature. She was also fond of her cat Tory, a black and white female, who lived to be eighteen.
Mary Stewart died on 9 May 2014.
They were well received by critics, due especially to her skillful story-telling and elegant prose. Her novels are also known for their well-crafted settings, many in England but also in such exotic locations as Damascus and the Greek islands, as well as France and Austria.
She was at the height of her popularity from the late 1950s to the 1980s, when many of her novels were translated into other languages. The Moon-Spinners, one of her most popular novels, was also made into a Disney movie.
Stewart was one of the most prominent writers of the romantic suspense subgenre, blending romance novels and mystery.
Critically, her works are considered superior to those of other acclaimed romantic suspense novelists, such as Victoria Holt and Phyllis Whitney. She seamlessly combined the two genres, maintaining a full mystery while focusing on the courtship between two people, so that the process of solving the mystery helps to illuminate the hero's personality -thereby helping the heroine to fall in love with him.
In the late 1960s a new generation of young readers revived a readership in T. H. White's The Once and Future King (published in full 1958) and The Lord of the Rings (published in full 1956), and as a consequence Arthurian and heroic legends regained popularity among a critical mass of readers.
Mary Stewart added to this climate by publishing The Crystal Cave (1970), the first in what was to become a four-book series later dubbed The Merlin Chronicles. The book placed Stewart on the best-seller list many times throughout the 1970s and 1980s.
More information: The Guardian
Mary Stewart
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