Monica Dickens

Monica Dickens (born 10 May 1915, died 25 December 1992) was a British writer, the great-granddaughter of Charles Dickens.

Biography

Having become disillusioned with the world she was brought up in - she was expelled from St Paul's Girls' School in London before she was presented at court as a debutante - she decided to go into service despite herself coming from the privileged class; her experiences as a cook and general servant would form the nucleus of her first book, "One Pair Of Hands" in 1939. "One Pair Of Feet" (1942) recounted her work as a nurse, and subsequently she worked in an aircraft factory and on a local newspaper - her experiences in the latter field of work inspired her 1951 book "My Turn To Make The Tea". Soon after this, she moved to the United States after marrying a US Marine officer, but continued to write, most of her books being set in Britain. She was also a regular columnist for the British women's magazine "Woman's Own" for twenty years.

Monica Dickens had strong humanitarian interests which were manifested in her work with the National Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children (reflected in her 1953 book "No More Meadows" and her 1964 work "Kate and Emma"), the Royal Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals (coming to the fore in her 1963 book "Cobbler's Dream"), and the Samaritans, the subject of her 1970 novel "The Listeners" - she helped to found the first American branch of the Samaritans in Massachusetts in 1974. From 1970 onwards she wrote a number of children's books; the Follyfoot series of books followed on from her earlier adult novel "Cobbler's Dream", and were also the basis of a children's TV series produced by Yorkshire Television for the UK's ITV network between 1971 and 1973 (and popular around the world for many years thereafter).

In 1985 Monica Dickens returned to the UK after the death of her husband, and continued to write until her death on Christmas Day 1992, her final book being published posthumously. She was also an occasional broadcaster for most of her writing career.

Adult books

One Pair Of Hands (1939)

Mariana (1940)

One Pair Of Feet (1942)

The Fancy (1943)

Thursday Afternoons (1945)

The Happy Prisoner (1946)

Joy and Josephine (1948)

Flowers on the Grass (1949)

My Turn To Make The Tea (1951)

No More Meadows (1953)

The Winds of Heaven (1955)

The Angel in the Corner (1956)

Man Overboard (1958)

The Heart of London (1961)

Cobbler's Dream (1963)

The Room Upstairs (1964)

Kate and Emma (1965)

The Landlord's Daughter (1968)

The Listeners (1970)

Last Year When I Was Young (1974)

An Open Book (1978) - autobiography

Talking of Horses (1978) - non-fiction

A Celebration (1984)

Dear Doctor Lily (1988)

Enchantment (1989)

Closed at Dusk (1990)

Scarred (1991)

One of the Family (1993)

Children's books

The World's End series:

The House at World's End (1970)

Summer at World's End (1971)

World's End in Winter (1972)

Spring Comes to World's End (1973)

The Follyfoot series:

Follyfoot (1971)

Dora at Follyfoot (1972)

The Horses of Follyfoot (1975)

Stranger at Follyfoot (1976)

The Messenger series:

The Messenger (1985)

Ballad of Favour (1985)

Cry of a Seagull (1986)

The Haunting of Bellamy 4 (1986)

Non-series:

The Great Escape (1975)

Quotes

"The limitless jet-lag purgatory of Immigration and Baggage at Heathrow."

"If a car passes me when I'm on a horse, I always think: if I were in that car and saw me, I would wish I was me. Wistful children's faces, staring out of the back window, agree."

Trivia

In 1964 Monica Dickens was signing books in Sydney, Australia, when she misheard "How much is it?" asked in an Australian accent as being a reference to a woman called "Emma Chissit". This led to the popular "Strine" books, a humorous guide to Australian English as it was in the 1960s.