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Margaret Kennedy

マーガレット・ケネディ

Māgaretto Kenedi

Aliases: Margaret Davies / Lady Davies

Profile

Gender
Female
Born
1896-04-23 （London, England）
Died
1967-07-31 （Adderbury, Oxfordshire, England） age 71
Nationality
United Kingdom
Languages
English
Residence History
London → Adderbury, Oxfordshire

Career

Occupations
Novelist, Playwright
Active Years
1922-1966

Education

Cheltenham Ladies' College
Period: -1915
Country: United Kingdom
Where she began writing
Somerville College, Oxford
History
Period: 1915-
Country: United Kingdom
Read History; contemporaries included Winifred Holtby, Vera Brittain et al.

Awards

James Tait Black Memorial Prize
1953
Work: Troy Chimneys
Organization: University of Edinburgh
Result: winner

Awards & Nominations

Works

Major Works

The Constant Nymph

1924 novel

Story of 14-year-old Tessa, daughter of a Tyrolean musical family, in love with composer Lewis Dodd. Highly successful as novel and play.

forbidden lovefamily bondsart and love
Adaptations
  • [play] The Constant Nymph / Basil Dean (1926)
  • [film] The Constant Nymph / Basil Dean (1928)
  • [film] The Constant Nymph / Paul Czinner (1933)
  • [film] The Constant Nymph / Edmund Goulding (1943)

The Ladies of Lyndon

1923 novel

Story of the ladies of Lyndon.

aristocracyfemale characters

Troy Chimneys

1953 novel

James Tait Black Memorial Prize winner.

historical perspectivehuman nature

The Feast

1950 novel

Novel starting with a disaster at a seaside hotel, then introducing characters.

fatehuman relationships

Escape Me Never

1934 play

Dramatization of The Fool of the Family.

lovefamily
Adaptations
  • [film] Escape Me Never (1935)
  • [film] Escape Me Never (1947)

Bibliography

  • A Century of Revolution 1789–1920
  • The Ladies of Lyndon
  • The Constant Nymph
  • The Constant Nymph (play)
  • A Long Week-End
  • Red Sky at Morning
  • The Fool of the Family
  • Return I Dare Not
  • A Long Time Ago
  • Escape Me Never
  • Together and Apart
  • Autumn
  • The Midas Touch
  • Where Stands A Wingèd Sentry
  • The Mechanized Muse
  • Happy with Either
  • The Feast
  • Jane Austen
  • Lucy Carmichael
  • Troy Chimneys
  • The Oracles
  • The Heroes of Clone
  • The Outlaws on Parnassus
  • A Night in Cold Harbour
  • The Forgotten Smile
  • Not in the Calendar: The Story of a Friendship
  • Women at Work

Adaptations

  • The Old Curiosity Shop (1934)
  • Escape Me Never (1935, 1947)
  • Whom the Gods Love (1936)
  • Dreaming Lips (1937)
  • Stolen Life (1939)
  • Return to Yesterday (1940)

Style & Themes

Literary Style
psychological novel techniquesdramatic structurepolished dialogue
Recurring Motifs
family conflictsartists' livesfateful disasters

Legacy

English novelist and playwright best remembered for The Constant Nymph. Prolific writer with several works adapted into films; won James Tait Black Memorial Prize in 1953.

Archives

  • Somerville College Library

Trivia

  • Cousin of novelist Joyce Cary
  • Grandmother of novelist Serena Mackesy
  • Daughter Julia Birley was also a novelist