Bawden, Nina 1925- (Nina Mary Mabey Bawden, Nina Mary Kark)

PERSONAL:

Born January 19, 1925, in Ilford, England; daughter of Charles and Ellalaine Ursula May Mabey; married H.W. Bawden (divorced); married Austen Steven Kark (an executive for British Broadcasting Corporation), 1954 (deceased); children: (first marriage) Nicholas Bawden (deceased), Robert Humphrey Felix Bawden; (second marriage) Perdita Emily Helena Kark. Education: Somerville College, Oxford, B.A., 1946, M.A., 1951; additional graduate study at Salzburg Seminar in American Studies, 1960. Hobbies and other interests: Traveling, reading.

CAREER:

Writer. Assistant, Town and Country Planning Associates, 1946-47; Justice of the Peace, Surrey, England, 1968-76.

MEMBER:

PEN, Royal Society of Literature (fellow), Society of Women Writers and Journalists (president), Authors Lending and Copyright Society, Lansdowne, Ski Club of Great Britain.

AWARDS, HONORS:

Guardian Award for Children's Fiction, 1975, for The Peppermint Pig; Yorkshire Post Novel of the Year Award, 1977, for Afternoon of a Good Woman; Booker Prize nomination, 1987, for Circles of Deceit; Phoenix Award, Children's Literature Association of North America, 1993, for Carrie's War; United Kingdom Hans Christian Andersen Award nominee, International Board of Books for Young Children, 1996; Granny the Pag was shortlisted British nominee for Carnegie Medal, 1996.

WRITINGS:

Eyes of Green, Morrow (New York, NY), 1953, published as Who Calls the Tune, Collins (London, England), 1953.

The Odd Flamingo, Collins (London, England), 1954.

Change Here for Babylon, Collins (London, England), 1955.

The Solitary Child, Collins (London, England), 1956.

Devil by the Sea, Collins (London, England), 1957, Lippincott (Philadelphia, PA), 1959, abridged edition for children, Lippincott (Philadelphia, PA), 1976.

Glass Slippers Always Pinch, Lippincott (Philadelphia, PA), 1960, published as Just Like a Lady, Longmans, Green (London, England), 1960.

In Honour Bound, Longmans, Green (London, England), 1961.

Tortoise by Candlelight, Harper (New York, NY), 1963, Virago (New York, NY), 1990.

Under the Skin, Harper (New York, NY), 1964.

A Little Love, a Little Learning, Longmans, Green (London, England), 1965, Harper & Row (New York, NY), 1966, Virago (London, England), 1990.

A Woman of My Age, Harper (New York, NY), 1967, Penguin Books (Baltimore, MD), 1974.

The Grain of Truth, Harper (New York, NY), 1968.

The Birds on the Trees, Longmans, Green (London, England), 1970, Penguin Books (Baltimore, MD), 1972, Virago (London, England), 1991.

Anna Apparent, Harper (New York, NY), 1972, Penguin Books (Baltimore, MD), 1974.

George beneath a Paper Moon, Harper (New York, NY), 1974.

Afternoon of a Good Woman, Harper (New York, NY), 1976.

Familiar Passions, Morrow (New York, NY), 1979.

Walking Naked, St. Martin's Press (New York, NY), 1981, Virago (London, England), 1992.

The Ice House, St. Martin's Press (New York, NY), 1983.

Circles of Deceit, St. Martin's Press (New York, NY), 1987.

Family Money, St. Martin's Press (New York, NY), 1991.

In My Own Time: Almost an Autobiography, Clarion (New York, NY), 1994.

The Ruffian on the Stair, Virago (London, England), 2001.

Dear Austen, Virago (London, England), 2005.

Also author of A Nice Change, 1997.

JUVENILE

The Secret Passage, Gollancz (London, England), 1963, published as The House of Secrets, Lippincott (Philadelphia, PA), 1964, Clarion (New York, NY), 1992.

On the Run, Gollancz (London, England), 1964, published as Three on the Run, Lippincott (Philadelphia, PA), 1965.

The White Horse Gang, Lippincott (Philadelphia, PA), 1966, Puffin Books (Harmondsworth, England), 1972, Clarion (New York, NY), 1992.

The Witch's Daughter, Lippincott (Philadelphia, PA), 1966, Clarion (New York, NY), 1991.

A Handful of Thieves, Lippincott (Philadelphia, PA), 1967, Clarion (New York, NY), 1991.

The Runaway Summer, Lippincott (Philadelphia, PA), 1969, Puffin Books (Harmondsworth, England), 1972.

Squib, Lippincott (Philadelphia, PA), 1971, Penguin Books (Harmondsworth, England), 1973, illustrated by Hank Blaustein, Lothrop (New York, NY), 1982.

Carrie's War, Lippincott (Philadelphia, PA), 1973, G.K. Hall (Boston, MA), 1976, illustrated by Faith Jaques, Penguin Books (New York, NY), 1980.

The Peppermint Pig, Lippincott (Philadelphia, PA), 1975, Dell (New York, NY), 1988.

Rebel on a Rock, Lippincott (Philadelphia, PA), 1978.

The Robbers, Lothrop (New York, NY), 1979.

(Adapter) William Tell, illustrated by Pascale Allamand, Lothrop (New York, NY), 1981.

Kept in the Dark, Lothrop (New York, NY), 1982.

St. Francis of Assisi (nonfiction), Lothrop (New York, NY), 1983.

The Finding, Lothrop (New York, NY), 1985.

Princess Alice, Deutsch (London, England), 1985.

Henry, Lothrop (New York, NY), 1988, published as Keeping Henry, Gollancz (London, England), 1988.

The Outside Child, Gollancz (London, England), 1989, Puffin Books (New York, NY), 1994.

Humbug, Houghton (Boston, MA), 1992, Puffin Books (New York, NY), 1994.

The Real Plato Jones, Houghton (Boston, MA), 1993.

Granny the Pag, Clarion (New York, NY), 1996, Puffin Books (New York, NY), 1998.

Off the Road, Clarion (New York, NY), 1998.

Contributor to newspapers, including Evening Standard and the Daily Telegraph.

ADAPTATIONS:

Many of Bawden's children's stories have been adapted for television, including Carrie's War, broadcast in the United States on PBS-TV; Circles of Deceit was made into a BBC film; Family Money was produced as a four-part television serial, 1997.

SIDELIGHTS:

Author of numerous novels for both children and adults, Nina Bawden is "perhaps best known for her incisive satirical inquiry into the family relationships of the educated middle class," noted Gerda Seaman in a Dictionary of Literary Biography essay. Since beginning her career with less-well-known mystery, gothic, and horror stories, Bawden "has moved toward the psychological investigation of modern middle-class existence," continued Seaman. "With an urbane irony and often surprising violence, she exposes the uneasy alliances which keep chaos at bay and provides a circumstantial account of the domesticated brutality at the heart of modern life."

In The Ice House, for example, Bawden introduces Daisy Brown and Ruth Perkins, two women who have been close friends since childhood. When Daisy's husband is killed in an accident, Ruth comes to realize that her friend's marriage was not as happy as it appeared. Indeed, Ruth finds her own marriage in jeopardy upon discovering her husband's longtime affair. Washington Post contributor Elizabeth Ward finds Bawden's use of this situation ironic: "What [the death] catalyzes is not, as one might expect, the unraveling of Ruth's and Daisy's secure family lives. It is the gradual realization of both families that their lives were pretty unraveled already, shredded by false expectations, misplaced trust and betrayal." In addition, the author's portrayal of Ruth's increasingly perplexing search to discover and oust her husband's mistress leads Ward to comment that "it is impossible not to admire the ease with which Bawden manipulates the intricate elements of her plot."

Bawden creates a similarly tangled group of misleading relationships in Circles of Deceit, a novel that was nominated for the prestigious Booker Prize. The story is narrated by an artist who, appropriately, paints fine copies of the Old Masters; his first wife betrayed him by having an affair, while his second wife is hiding the abuse of her own son. "Ms. Bawden makes comic use of these characters' foibles, but there is considerable sadness beneath her evocative scenes and lively dialogue," observed Laurel Graeber in New York Times Book Review. In showing the characters' lies and deceptions, the author also reveals the distress they cause themselves. As Jennifer McKay stated in the Listener, "emotional pain is something Bawden portrays well, perhaps because she knows it is as likely to show itself in banal words and actions as in heroics." Although commenting that the pace of the book is slow, Graeber remarked that Bawden "makes the reader care about these people's trials. However much her characters deceive," concluded Graeber, "it's refreshing to see that Nina Bawden's own talent is nothing less than genuine."

Family Money, Bawden's next adult novel, tells the story of Fanny Pye, a widow in London who has witnessed a violent attack that left a man dead in the street before her eyes, just before she herself was knocked unconscious by the perpetrator. The trauma of the incident incites partial amnesia and a case of agoraphobia in Fanny, and she finds herself struggling to deal with the smallest issues. A reviewer for Publishers Weekly remarked that "Fanny's troubles and their eventual resolution make a compelling read."

In My Own Time: Almost an Autobiography is Bawden's version of writing her memoirs. Instead of chronicling her life year by year, Bawden offers readers a jumble of memories and thoughts of the years she has lived and the things she has seen and done, serving as an insight not only into the woman's experiences but into the writer's thought process. Much of her life has been shaped by family and the stories that spring up from living and loving the people around her. Among other things, Bawden discusses her eldest son, a schizophrenic who died in 1981, and the heartache inherent in outliving a child. Mary M. Burns, reviewing for Horn Book, noted that Bawden offers "insight into the process by which a writer fashions raw material into a polished work of art."

Dear Austen is a poignant and heartfelt love letter and farewell that Bawden wrote to her husband, Austen Kark, who was killed in a train wreck when he and Bawden were traveling to a party in Cambridge. Bawden, herself injured in the crash, recounts the experience of the train derailing, and barely making it out alive. The incident was followed by surgeries and mourning, as well as the legal issues that stemmed from the accident and the railway's refusal to accept culpability, and, of course, learning to live without her husband of nearly fifty years. Tom Rosenthal, in a review for Spectator, remarked: "This book is a quite murderous political tract, which, considering that Austen was surely the victim of manslaughter by negligence—if not by intent—seems entirely appropriate. Bawden's style is impeccable, her language temperate, but the burden of her tirade is devastating."

Bawden has also written many novels for young adults, and in them "we see a real world," asserted Nicholas Tucker in Children's Literature in Education: a world "stretching from junk yards to prim, over-immaculate front parlours. Yet it would be facile to place this author in any simple ‘social realist’ category, since at the same time she is also taken up with the theme of fantasy, both in her characters' lives and in the stories themselves as she writes them." Tucker explained: "The result, then, is neither fantasy nor realism, but the tension between them."

Carrie's War is perhaps Bawden's best-known children's novel, relating the evacuation of a young girl and her brother to a bleak Welsh mining town during World War II. A Times Literary Supplement reviewer observed that while Bawden's work has been "immensely readable and accessible yet often thought-provoking," Carrie's War is "altogether more moving, richer and stranger than anything she has achieved before. If it is not partly autobiographical, it certainly feels as if it is." "Miss Bawden has written outstanding books," maintained Catherine Storr in her New Statesman review. "It's because she writes with compassion and with insight and above all with honesty." Similarly, Bawden's Henry, a story again set on a Welsh farm during the War, recalls autobiography. Deborah Singmaster wrote in the Times Literary Supplement that the story is "so artfully remembered and retold that it will charm both children and adults alike."

The Peppermint Pig tells the story of the four Greengrass children, who live with their parents in London and enjoy a happy, safe existence until their father is suddenly accused of taking money from his boss. Though innocent, the father knows the who the true thief is and takes the blame for him rather than allow the man's elderly father to learn his son has been stealing. Ultimately, the father leaves for America to make his fortune, leaving the family behind until he is ready to send for them. Into this dark and gloomy existence comes Johnnie, the peppermint pig—peppermint being another name for the runt of the litter. Under the children's care, however, Johnnie grows fat and healthy, and therefore, of course, must serve the purpose most pigs serve. Jill Murphy, writing for the Bookbag Web site, remarked of the book: "It tells the story of a difficult yet happy year for the Greengrass children with both earthy humor and matter-of-fact truth. But it never, ever stops being first and foremost a great story."

Granny the Pag follows the adventures of Catriona, whose actor parents have left her to be raised by her grandmother, much to her dismay. Frightened and unhappy, little Catriona puts a sign on her grandmother's door, intending it to read that "granny is a pig." However, a spelling error means her grandmother is forever called a "pag," and the nickname ends up representing the close bond the two form. That is, until Catriona's parents decide they want her back. Booklist reviewer Stephanie Zvirin remarked that "Catriona's struggle to have her wishes recognized by grown-ups will strike a responsive chord among readers."

In Off the Road, Bawden tries her hand at science fiction in a children's book set in the future. America in 2040 has been divided into two sections, "inside," which is supposedly safe and where families are governed by laws that maintain order and repel chaos, and "outside," where criminals roam free with rebels who refuse to be shut up behind the government's wall. When eleven-year-old Tom follows his grandfather in his escape outside, he discovers that the chaotic world is nothing like he expected, and that freedom is far more important than he knew. Hazel Rochman, writing for Booklist, commented that "the characters will make readers think about ideas: How much do we give up for technology, privacy, order?"

"All Nina Bawden's books have a definite quality," says Tucker; "the humour is abundant and never forced, and there are always moments of great pace and excitement." Seaman concludes that "to read [Bawden's] work is to encounter a writer of great integrity. … Her clear-eyed satiric studies of men, women, and children have always probed the hypocritical motive and the mechanical response. Most recently they have also offered us honest alternatives."

BIOGRAPHICAL AND CRITICAL SOURCES:

BOOKS

Bawden, Nina, In My Own Time: Almost an Autobiography, Clarion (New York, NY), 1994.

Bawden, Nina, Dear Austen, Virago (London, England), 2005.

Children's Literature Review, Volume 2, Gale (Detroit, MI), 1976.

Contemporary Novelists, St. James Press (Detroit, MI), 1996.

Dictionary of Literary Biography, Volume 14: British Novelists since 1960, Gale (Detroit, MI), 1983.

Something about the Author Autobiography Series, Volume 16, Gale (Detroit, MI), 1993.

Twentieth-Century Young Adult Writers, St. James Press (Detroit, MI), 1994.

PERIODICALS

Booklist, April 1, 1996, Stephanie Zvirin, review of Granny the Pag, p. 1302; September 15, 1998, Hazel Rochman, review of Off the Road, p. 218.

Children's Literature in Education, number 13, 1974, Nicholas Tucker.

Horn Book, May 1, 1996, Mary M. Burns, review of In My Own Time, p. 354.

Listener, September 10, 1987, Jennifer McKay, review of Circles of Deceit, p. 23.

New Statesman, May 25, 1973, Catherine Storr, review of Carrie's War, p. 778.

New York Times Book Review, November 29, 1987, Laurel Graeber, review of Circles of Deceit, p. 20.

Publishers Weekly, October 18, 1991, review of Family Money, p. 50.

Spectator, April 16, 2005, Tom Rosenthal, "The End of the Line," p. 46.

Times Literary Supplement, April 6, 1973, review of Carrie's War, p. 383; June 24, 1988, Deborah Singmaster, review of Henry, 716.

Washington Post, August 29, 1983, Elizabeth Ward, review of The Ice House, p. C3.

ONLINE

Bookbag,http://www.thebookbag.co.uk/ (November 19, 2007), Jill Murphy, review of The Peppermint Pig.