Kate O'Brien (novelist) facts for kids
Quick facts for kids
Kate O'Brien
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O’Brien in 1926
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| Born | Kathleen Mary Louise O'Brien 3 December 1897 Limerick City, Ireland |
| Died | 13 August 1974 (aged 76) Canterbury, England, UK |
| Occupation | Novelist and playwright |
Kate O'Brien (born December 3, 1897 – died August 13, 1974) was an Irish writer. She wrote many novels and plays. She is known for writing about important topics for her time. She also helped change strict rules about books in Ireland.
Contents
Kate O'Brien's Life Story
Kathleen Mary Louise "Kate" O'Brien was born in Limerick City, Ireland, in 1897. Her family was middle-class. When she was five, her mother passed away. She then joined her older sisters as a student at Laurel Hill Convent. She was the youngest student there.
In 1919, she finished her studies at University College, Dublin. She studied English and French. After that, she moved to London and worked as a teacher for a year.
From 1922 to 1923, Kate worked as a governess in Bilbao, Spain. A governess is a teacher who lives with a family. It was here that she started writing stories. When she returned to England, she worked for a newspaper called the Manchester Guardian.
Kate married a journalist named Gustaff Reiner in 1922. But their marriage ended in less than a year. In 1926, her play Distinguished Villa became very successful. After this, she decided to become a full-time writer. Her first novel, Without My Cloak, won two important awards in 1931: the James Tait Black Prize and the Hawthornden Prize.
Many of Kate O'Brien's books talked about important topics for her time. For example, her 1936 novel, Mary Lavelle, was not allowed to be sold in Ireland and Spain. This is called being "banned." Her book The Land of Spices was also banned in Ireland when it came out.
Besides novels, she wrote plays, movie scripts, and short stories. She also wrote essays and many newspaper articles. She wrote two books about people's lives and two travel books. Kate O'Brien always felt a special connection to Spain. Her time in Spain inspired Mary Lavelle. She also wrote a book about a Spanish mystic named Teresa of Avila. She used the story of a Spanish king, Philip II, and a princess, Maria de Mendoza, to write her novel That Lady. This book was against unfair governments.
Even though Kate O'Brien lived outside Ireland for most of her life, her home country was very important to her writing. Many of her novels are set in Ireland, in a made-up town she called 'Mellick'. This town was based on Limerick. She also lived in a place called Roundstone in Connemara for some time in the 1950s.
She wrote a regular newspaper column for The Irish Times called From a Distance. In this column, she shared her mixed feelings about Ireland. In her novels after 1936, she often wrote about how she disagreed with some of the strict rules in Ireland back then. This was especially true during the years when Éamon de Valera was in charge. Her work promoted the idea of a European identity. She believed this identity was based on Christian traditions, even though she herself did not follow a specific religion.
Kate O'Brien wrote a travel book called Farewell Spain. She wrote it to support the people fighting for freedom in the Spanish Civil War. Some people believe she supported ideas about freedom and fairness in the 1930s. She also wrote another travel book called My Ireland (1962). In this book, she wrote about the places in Ireland she loved, like Connemara. She also wrote about places that did not impress her, like Dublin.
Kate O'Brien was a strong supporter of equal rights for girls and boys. Her novels often featured young women who wanted to be independent. She wanted people to understand and accept all kinds of people. She wrote about characters who were unique and brave. This made her a pioneer in showing different kinds of people in literature.
She was very critical of the strict rules in Ireland. Her books being banned showed how strict the Irish censorship laws were. Censorship laws decide what books, movies, or other media are allowed to be seen or read. After a discussion in the Irish senate about banning The Land of Spices, and a campaign supported by writers like Seán Ó Faoláin, the censorship laws were changed a little in 1946. They created a special board to review banned books. The Land of Spices, which was banned in 1941, was allowed again in 1949. However, Mary Lavelle was never officially allowed again. In this way, Kate O'Brien helped to end some of the strict cultural rules in Ireland from the 1930s and 40s.
She lived most of her life in England and passed away in Faversham, near Canterbury, in 1974. When she died, she was not wealthy, and most of her books were not being printed anymore. But in the 1980s, her work was rediscovered by scholars who studied women's rights. Her books were then reprinted by publishers like Arlen House in Dublin and Virago in London. Today, she is seen as a very important Irish writer from the 20th century.
Kate O'Brien's Legacy
The Glucksman Library at the University of Limerick has a large collection of Kate O'Brien's writings.
In August 2005, Penguin Books reprinted her last novel, As Music and Splendour (1958). It had not been printed for many years.
The Limerick Literary Festival, which honors Kate O’Brien, happens every year in Limerick. Many people, including students and teachers, attend it.
In the famous film Brief Encounter (1945), a character named Laura (Celia Johnson) mentions she has reserved "the new Kate O'Brien" at her local library. This shows how popular Kate O'Brien was in the 1940s. She then became less known for decades. But in the 1980s, she was "rediscovered" as a key writer.
Kate O'Brien's Books
- Without My Cloak (1931) – (won the James Tait Black Prize and Hawthornden Prize)
- The Ante-Room (1934)
- Mary Lavelle (1936) (later made into the 1998 film Talk of Angels)
- Pray for the Wanderer (1938)
- The Land of Spices (1941)
- The Last of Summer (1943)
- That Lady (1946) (later a 1949 Broadway show and a 1955 movie)
- The Flower of May (1953) – (won the Book of the Year award from the Women Writers Association in Ireland)
- As Music and Splendour (1958)
- Constancy (two chapters of a book she didn't finish were published in 1972)
Kate O'Brien's Plays
- Distinguished Villa: A Play in Three Acts (1926)
- Gloria Gish
- The Anteroom (based on her novel)
- That Lady: A Romantic Drama (based on her novel, 1949)
Kate O'Brien's Film Scripts
- Mary Magdalen
- A Broken Song
Kate O'Brien's Life Stories and Essays
- Teresa of Avila (a biography, 1951)
- Presentation Parlour (a biography, 1963)
- English Diaries and Journals (a book about literary criticism, 1943)
- Kate O'Brien: Self-Portrait (a TV documentary, broadcast March 28, 1962; Kate O'Brien wrote the script)
Kate O'Brien's Travel Books
- Farewell Spain (a political travel book, 1937)
- Dublin and Cork (a photo book with text by O'Brien, 1961)
- My Ireland (a travel book, 1962)
Kate O'Brien's Journalism
- Long Distance (a column for The Irish Times newspaper, 1967–71)
- Book reviews
Movies Based on Kate O'Brien's Books
- That Lady (1955) starring Olivia de Havilland, Gilbert Roland, and Paul Scofield
- Last of Summer (TV, 1977)
- Talk of Angels (1998) starring Polly Walker, Vincent Perez, Franco Nero, Frances McDormand, Ruth McCabe and Penélope Cruz
See also
In Spanish: Kate O'Brien para niños
- Limerick
- Irish literature
- Censorship in the Republic of Ireland
- Feminist history in the United Kingdom
- List of people on stamps of Ireland
