Susanna Clarke


Susanna [Mary] Clarke was born November 1, 1959 in Nottingham, England. She was the eldest daughter of a Methodist Minister and spent her childhood in various towns across Northern England and Scotland. She attended St Hilda's College, Oxford, graduating in 1981 with a Bachelor of Arts degree in philosophy, politics, and economics. In the following eight years she worked in publishing at Quarto and Gordon Fraser, then in 1990 she went abroard for two years, teaching English as a foreign language in Turin, Italy and Bilbao, Spain

In 1992 she returned to England, having departed from teaching, and spent the remainder of the year in County Durham Early the following year she compiled her notes for what would be Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell and attempted to write the novel. Clarke realized that a more formal education in Fiction writing might be an asset and thus applied to the Arvon Foundation, a charity for writers in Britain, wherein the student would receive an intensified education during a four- or five-day course with two tutors.

After investigating several of the fantasy-orienented course offerings, Clarke opted for the one mentored by Colin Greenland and Geoff Ryman since they were on the literary end of fantasy. Greenland sent one of Clarke's stories from the course, "The Ladies of Grace Adieu," to Neil Gaiman, who in turn shared it with Patrick Nielsen Hayden. Hayden bought Clarke's tale for publication in his Starlight 1 (1996) anthology.

In the following decade, Clarke was employed as an editor of cookbooks at Simon & Schuster's Cambridge office. During this time, she published seven short stories and novellas in US anthologies. One, "The Duke of Wellington Misplaces His Horse" (1999), first appeared in a limited-edition, illustrated chapbook from Green Man Press. Another, "Mr Simonelli, or The Fairy Widower," was shortlisted for a World Fantasy Award in 2001. Many of Clarke's short tales relate to the world of her first novel, Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell.