Книга: P. D. James «The Lighthouse»

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

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

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

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.