P. D. James

P. D. James
Born	3 August 1920 (1920-08-03) (age 91) Oxford, England
Occupation	Novelist
Nationality	British
Genres	Crime fiction Thriller Dystopian fiction
Influences Jane Austen, Graham Greene, Ngaio Marsh, Margery Allingham, Dorothy L. Sayers, Evelyn Waugh
Influenced Morag Joss

Phyllis Dorothy James, Baroness James of Holland Park, OBE, FRSA, FRSL (born 3 August 1920), commonly known as P. D. James, is an English crime writer and Conservative life peer in the House of Lords, most famous for a series of detective novels starring policeman and poet Adam Dalgliesh.^[1]

Life and career

James was born in Oxford, the daughter of Sidney James, a tax inspector, and educated at the British School in Ludlow and Cambridge High School for Girls.^[2] She began writing in the mid-1950s.^[3] Her first novel, Cover Her Face, featuring the investigator and poet Adam Dalgliesh of New Scotland Yard, named after a teacher at Cambridge High School, was published in 1962.^[4] Many of James's mystery novels take place against the backdrop of the UK's bureaucracies such as the criminal justice system and the health services, arenas in which James had worked for decades, starting in the 1940s when she went to work in hospital administration to help support her ailing husband and two children. Two years after the publication of Cover Her Face, James's husband died and she took a position as a civil servant within the criminal section of the Home Office. James worked in government service until her retirement in 1979. She is an Anglican and a Lay Patron of the Prayer Book Society, her 2001 work, Death in Holy Orders, displaying a grasp of the inner workings of church hierarchy .^[5] Her later novels are often set in a community closed in some way, such as a publishing house or barristers' chambers, a theological college, an island or a private clinic. The Adam Dalgliesh novel, The Private Patient, was published in August 2008 in the U.K. by Faber & Faber (US, (November 2008, Alfred A. Knopf) and Talking About Detective Fiction was published in 2009. Over her writing career she has also written many essays and short stories for periodicals and anthologies, which have yet to be collected. She revealed in 2011 that The Private Patient was the final Dalgliesh novel. ^[6].

As guest editor of BBC Radio 4's Today programme in December 2009, James conducted an interview of BBC Director-General Mark Thompson, in which she seemed critical of some of his decisions. Regular Today presenter Evan Davis commented that "She shouldn't be guest editing; she should be permanently presenting the programme".^[7] In 2008, she was inducted into the International Crime Writing Hall of Fame at the inaugural ITV3 Crime Thriller Awards.^[8]

Film and television

During the 1980s, many of James's mystery novels were adapted for television by Anglia Television for the ITV network in the UK. These productions have been broadcast in other countries, including the USA on its PBS channel. These productions featured Roy Marsden as Adam Dalgliesh. The BBC has since adapted Death in Holy Orders (2003) and The Murder Room (2004) as one-off dramas starring Martin Shaw as Dalgliesh.

Her 1992 novel The Children of Men was the basis for a 2006 feature film of the same name, directed by Alfonso Cuarón and starring Clive Owen, Julianne Moore and Michael Caine.^[9] Despite substantial changes from the book, James was reportedly pleased with the adaptation and proud to be associated with the film.^[10]

Books

Novels

Adam Dalgliesh mysteries

1. Cover Her Face (1962)
2. A Mind to Murder (1963)
3. Unnatural Causes (1967)
4. Shroud for a Nightingale (1971)
5. The Black Tower (1975)
6. Death of an Expert Witness (1977)
7. A Taste for Death (1986)
8. Devices and Desires (1989)
9. Original Sin (1994)
10. A Certain Justice (1997)
11. Death in Holy Orders (2001)
12. The Murder Room (2003)
13. The Lighthouse (2005)
14. The Private Patient (2008)

Cordelia Gray mysteries

• An Unsuitable Job for a Woman (1972)
• The Skull Beneath the Skin (1982)

Miscellaneous novels

• Innocent Blood (1980)
• The Children of Men (1992)
• Death Comes to Pemberley (2011)

Omnibus editions

• Crimes Time Three (1979), later reprinted as Three Complete Novels (1988), comprising Cover Her Face, A Mind to Murder, and Shroud for a Nightingale
• Murder in Triplicate (1980), comprising Unnatural Causes, An Unsuitable Job for a Woman, and The Black Tower
• Trilogy of Death (1984), comprising Innocent Blood, An Unsuitable Job for a Woman, and The Skull Beneath the Skin
• A Dalgliesh Trilogy (1989), comprising Shroud for a Nightingale, The Black Tower, and Death of an Expert Witness
• A Second Dalgliesh Trilogy (1993), comprising A Mind to Murder, A Taste for Death, and Devices and Desires
• An Adam Dalgliesh Omnibus (2008), comprising A Taste for Death, Devices and Desires, and Original Sin

Non-fiction

• The Maul and the Pear Tree: The Ratcliffe Highway Murders, 1811 (1971), with Thomas A. Critchley
• Time to Be in Earnest: A Fragment of Autobiography (1999)
• Talking About Detective Fiction (2009)

TV and film adaptations

• 1984 Shroud for a Nightingale
• 1985 Cover Her Face
• Unnatural Causes
• Original Sin
• The Black Tower
• Death of an Expert Witness
• A Taste For Death
• Devices and Desires
• A Mind to Murder
• A Certain Justice
• An Unsuitable Job for a Woman
• 2003 Death in Holy Orders
• 2004 The Murder Room
• 2006 Children of Men (feature film).^[9]

Selected awards and honours

Honours

• Officer of the Order of the British Empire, 1983
• Associate Fellow of Downing College, Cambridge, 1986
• Life peerage, Baroness James of Holland Park (of Southwold in the County of Suffolk), 1991
• Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature
• Fellow of the Royal Society of Arts
• President of the Society of Authors 1997–

Honorary Doctorates

• University of Buckingham, 1992
• University of Hertfordshire, 1994
• University of Glasgow, 1995
• University of Essex, 1996
• University of Durham, 1998
• University of Portsmouth, 1999
• University of London, 1993

Honorary Fellowships

• St Hilda's College, Oxford, 1996
• Girton College, Cambridge, 2000
• Downing College, Cambridge, 2000
• Kellogg College, Oxford

^[11]

Awards

• 1971 Best Novel Award, Mystery Writers of America (runner-up): Shroud for a Nightingale
• 1971 Crime Writers' Association (CWA) Macallan Silver Dagger for Fiction: Shroud for a Nightingale
• 1973 Best Novel Award, Mystery Writers of America (runner-up): An Unsuitable Job for a Woman
• 1975 CWA Macallan Silver Dagger for Fiction: The Black Tower
• 1986 CWA Macallan Silver Dagger for Fiction: A Taste for Death
• 1986 Mystery Writers of America Best Novel Award (runner-up): A Taste for Death
• 1987 CWA Cartier Diamond Dagger (lifetime achievement award)
• 1992 Deo Gloria Award: The Children of Men
• 1999 Grandmaster Award, Mystery Writers of America
• 2002 WH Smith Literary Award (shortlist): Death in Holy Orders
• 2005 British Book Awards Crime Thriller of the Year (shortlist): The Murder Room
• 2007 Theakston's Old Peculier Crime Novel of the Year Award (longlist): The Lighthouse
• 2010 Nick Clarke Award for interview with Director-General of the BBC Mark Thompson whilst guest editor of the Today programme^[12]

Bibliography

• Richard B Gidez. P. D. James. Twayne’s English Authors Series, New York: Twayne, 1986.
• Norma Siebenheller. P. D. James. New York: Ungar, 1981.

References

1. ^ UK Parliament – Alphabetical List of Members.
2. ^ "Faber & Faber : P. D. James". Faber.co.uk. 2008-09-22. http://www.faber.co.uk/author/p-d-james/. Retrieved 2010-05-20. 
3. ^ The Guardian Paperback Writer Column – Why Detection? by P.D. James
4. ^ The Salon Interview – P.D. James – The Art of Murder
5. ^ "Why I am still an Anglican", Continuum, 2006, page 16
6. ^ Guardian interview, 2011
7. ^ Guardian review, 31 Dec 2009
8. ^ Allen, Katie (2008-10-06). "Rankin and P D James pick up ITV3 awards". theBookseller.com. http://www.thebookseller.com/news/68347-rankin-and-p-d-james-pick-up-itv3-awards.html. Retrieved 2008-10-06. 
9. ^ ^{a b} Children of Men at IMDB
10. ^ "P. D. James Pleased With Film Version of Children of Men". internetwritingjournal.com. 2007-01-08. http://www.internetwritingjournal.com/cgi-bin/iwjblog.pl?id=108071. Retrieved 2008-05-20. 
11. ^ British Council contemporary writers
12. ^ "PD James wins BBC's Nick Clarke Award for journalism". New Statesman. 2010-10-12. http://www.newstatesman.com/broadcast/2010/10/bbc-radio-interview-award. 

External links

• The British Council's Contemporary Writers. Accessed 2010-09-15
• Faber and Faber (U.K.), publisher. Accessed 2010-09-15
• Random House (U.S.), publisher. Accessed 2010-09-15
• Penguin Books (U.K.), publisher. Accessed 2010-09-15

Interviews

• Shusha Guppy (Summer 1995). "P. D. James, The Art of Fiction No. 141". The Paris Review. http://www.theparisreview.org/interviews/1627/the-art-of-fiction-no-141-p-d-james. 
• Salon online magazine (U.S.), 26-2-98. Accessed 2010-09-15
• Guardian newspaper group (U.K.), 4-3-01. Accessed 2010-09-15
• The Sunday Herald newspaper (U.K.), 13-9-08. Accessed 2010-09-15
• CBC News broadcasting (Canada), 22-9-08. Accessed 2010-09-15
• The Globe and Mail newspaper (Canada), 30-1-09. Accessed 2010-09-15
• The Daily Telegraph newspaper (U.K.), 21-7-10. Accessed 2010-09-15
• The Independent newspaper (U.K.), 29-9-08. Accessed 2010-09-15
• The American Spectator magazine (U.S.), 4-1-10. Accessed 2010-09-15
• Extended audio discussion on Death Comes to Pemberley for the Faber website. Recorded October 2011.
• Video interview discussing Death Comes to Pemberley. Filmed October 2011.

Persondata
Name	James, P. D.
Alternative names
Short description
Date of birth	3 August 1920
Place of birth	Oxford, England
Date of death
Place of death