Jones, Diana Wynne 1934–

PERSONAL: Born August 16, 1934, in London, England; daughter of Richard Aneurin (an educator) and Marjorie (an educator; maiden name, Jackson) Jones; married John A. Burrow (a university professor), De-cember 23, 1956; children: Richard, Michael, Colin. Education: St. Anne's College, Oxford, B.A., 1956.

ADDRESSES: Home—9, The Polygon, Clifton, Bristol B58 4PW, England. Agent—Laura Cecil, 17 Alwyne Villas, London N1 2HG, England.

CAREER: Writer, 1965–.

AWARDS, HONORS: Guardian Award, 1977, for Charmed Life; Boston Globe-Horn Book Honor Book Award, 1984, for Archer's Goon; Horn Book Honor List, 1984, for Fire and Hemlock; Horn Book Fanfare List, 1987, for Howl's Moving Castle; Mythopoeic Children's Fantasy Award, 1996, for The Crown of Dalemark, and 1999, for Dark Lord of Derkholm.

WRITINGS:

ADULT FICTION

Changeover, Macmillan (London, England), 1970.

A Sudden Wild Magic, Morrow (New York, NY), 1993.

JUVENILE FICTION

Wilkins' Tooth, Macmillan (London, England), 1973, published as Witch's Business, Dutton (New York, NY), 1974.

The Ogre Downstairs, Macmillan (London, England), 1974. Eight Days of Luke, Macmillan (London, England), 1974.

Dogsbody, Greenwillow (New York, NY), 1977.

Power of Three, Greenwillow (New York, NY), 1978.

Who Got Rid of Angus Flint?, illustrated by John Sewell, Evans Brothers (London, England), 1978.

The Four Grannies, illustrated by Thelma Lambert, Hamish Hamilton (London, England), 1980.

The Homeward Bounders, Greenwillow (New York, NY), 1981.

The Skiver's Guide, illustrated by Chris Winn, Knight Books (London, England), 1984.

Warlock at the Wheel and Other Stories, Greenwillow (New York, NY), 1984.

Archer's Goon, (also see below), Greenwillow (New York, NY), 1984.

Fire and Hemlock, Greenwillow (New York, NY), 1985.

Howl's Moving Castle, Greenwillow (New York, NY), 1986.

A Tale of Time City, Greenwillow (New York, NY), 1987.

Castle in the Air, Greenwillow (New York, NY), 1990.

Chair Person, illustrated by Glenys Ambrus, Puffin Books (New York, NY), 1991.

Black Maria, Methuen (London, England), 1991, published as Aunt Maria, Greenwillow (New York, NY), 1991.

A Sudden Wild Magic, Morrow (New York, NY), 1992.

Yes, Dear, illustrated by Graham Philpot, Greenwillow (New York, NY), 1992.

Hexwood, Greenwillow (New York, NY), 1993.

The Book of Changes, Douglas & McIntyre (Toronto, Ontario, Canada), 1994, Orchard Books (New York, NY), 1995.

The Time of the Ghost, Greenwillow (New York, NY), 1996.

Stopping for a Spell, Puffin Books (New York, NY), 1996.

Minor Arcana, Gollancz (London, England), 1996.

The Tough Guide to Fantasyland, Vista (London, England), 1996.

Dark Lord of Derkholm, Greenwillow (New York, NY), 1998.

Deep Secret, Tor (New York, NY), 1999.

Believing Is Seeing: Seven Stories, illustrated by Nenad Jakesevic, Greenwillow (New York, NY), 1999.

Year of the Griffin, Greenwillow (New York, NY), 2000.

Witch's Business, Greenwillow (New York, NY), 2002.

The Merlin Conspiracy, Greenwillow (New York, NY), 2003.

Wild Robert, Greenwillow (New York, NY), 2003.

Unexpected Magic: Collected Stories, Greenwillow (New York, NY), 2004.

Conrad's Fate, Greenwillow (New York, NY), 2005.

"CHRESTOMANCI" CYCLE; JUVENILES

Charmed Life, Macmillan (London, England), 1977, Greenwillow (New York, NY), 1979.

The Magicians of Caprona (also see below), Greenwil-low (New York, NY), 1980.

Witch Week (also see below), Greenwillow (New York, NY), 1982.

The Lives of Christopher Chant (also see below), Greenwillow (New York, NY), 1988.

Chronicles of Chrestomanci (contains Charmed Life, The Magicians of Caprona, Witch Week, and The Lives of Christopher Chant, HarperCollins (New York, NY), 2001.

Mixed Magics: Four Tales of Chrestomanci, Greenwillow (New York, NY), 2001.

"DALEMARK" CYCLE; JUVENILES

Cart and Cwidder, Macmillan (London, England), 1975, Atheneum (New York, NY), 1977, reprinted, HarperTrophy (New York, NY), 2001.

Drowned Ammet, Macmillan (London, England), 1977, Atheneum (New York, NY), 1978, reprinted, Harp-erTrophy (New York, NY), 2001.

The Spellcoats, Atheneum (New York, NY), 1979, reprinted, HarperTrophy (New York, NY), 2001.

The Crown of Dalemark, Greenwillow (New York, NY), 1995, reprinted, HarperTrophy (New York, NY), 2001.

JUVENILE PLAYS

The Batterpool Business, first produced in London at Arts Theatre, October, 1968.

The King's Things, first produced in London at Arts Theatre, February, 1970.

The Terrible Fisk Machine, first produced in London at Arts Theatre, January, 1971.

Archer's Goon (adapted from Jones's juvenile book of the same title), first produced on BBC, 1992.

Contributor to books, including The Cat-Flap and the Apple Pie, W.H. Allen (London, England), 1979; Hecate's Cauldron, DAW Books (New York, NY), 1981; Hundreds and Hundreds, Puffin Books (New York, NY), 1984; Dragons and Dreams, Harper (New York, NY), 1986; Guardian Angels, Viking Kestrel (London, England), 1987; (and editor) Fantasy Stories, NESFA, 1995; Everard's Ride (miscellany), NESFA, 1995; (and editor) Hidden Turnings, Greenwillow (New York, NY).

SIDELIGHTS: Diana Wynne Jones, best known for her "Chrestomanci" cycle of novels, creates works that straddle the line between fantasy and science fiction. Her fans on both sides of the Atlantic include many adults who may have read her earlier works as teens. Jones, influenced by Norse, Greek, and Welsh myth, and by an earlier generation of fantasy writers, has created both stand-alone and series fantasies that innovatively mingle magic and realism. Jane Yolen in the Washington Post Book World called Jones "one of those English wonders who can combine wit with wisdom. Her sense of humor weaves in and out of the most absurd plots and twists around outrageous situations with a deftness any vaudevillian would envy." Booklist contributor Michael Cart wrote: "To my mind, Diana Wynne Jones is one of the greatest living fantasists; that the knee of every book lover does not bow at the sound of her name has always puzzled me." Cart added that Jones is "a master of the unexpected and never fails to surprise…. Her powers of imagination are quite breathtaking, while her ability to create strange, quirky, offbeat, mind-tickling worlds is absolutely astonishing."

Jones as a child endured the outbreak of World War II and her parents' indifference to her. Beginning at age five, she moved frequently with her sisters and her mother, and even after the family settled in rural Essex in 1943 she was neglected and expected to care for her younger siblings. Her father doled out one book a year for the girls to share, and Jones was desperate to read more even though she suffered from dyslexia. At age eight she said she wanted to become a writer, although her family trivialized her ambitions.

After Jones married and had her own children, and the quality of the juvenile fiction she read to her sons disappointed her, she started writing her own stories and novels for children. Two of her early titles, Wilkins' Tooth and The Ogre Downstairs set the themes and tones of her later works. In both stories, intrepid youngsters must tangle with the supernatural and survive by wit and teamwork. Donna R. White wrote in Dictionary of Literary Biography: "An immensely funny book, The Ogre Downstairs also explores two of Jones's pervading themes: displacement and alienation."

Jones's neglected childhood inspired her plots, heroes and heroines. A St. James Guide to Young Adult Writers contributor said the typical Jones protagonist "is likely to grow up among magical folk, often in an alternative world where history ran differently, or a secondary fantasy world, but this hero/ine feels inadequate because s/he does not appear to have magic powers. Using his/her own resources to cope with the problems magic is causing, at the climax a crisis reveals that our hero/ine does truly possess magic powers, sometimes superior to the others, and certainly unique…. Jones's books may be classified as domestic fantasy, as magic disrupts ordinary life, sometimes combined with high fantasy, as gods and goddesses become involved." White wrote that in Jones's imagined worlds, "fathers are usually ineffective, selfish, neglectful, unloving parents. Mothers, while portrayed as negatively as fathers, often ignore their children's needs to pursue their own desires."

The Homeward Bounders, which reflects Jones's originality, is a novel in which "she postulates a fantasy war game that applies to all worlds and times," Sarah Hayes wrote in the Times Literary Supplement. The book, a fantasy novel with science fiction elements, "contains terror, humor, adventure, everyday problems of survival and references to mythical characters," added Times Literary Supplement contributor Judith Elkin. The story follows the adventures of Jamie, a teenager who accidentally witnesses how the worlds are run while randomly moving among them. Although he makes friends, including the Flying Dutchman, Ahasuerus the Wandering Jew, Prometheus chained to a rock, and several children, he cannot return home unless by accident.

The "Chrestomanci" works are set in a world where the government licenses and supervises magic. The handsome enchanter, Chrestomanci, is the recurring character in a series of loosely related stories, including Charmed Life, The Lives of Christopher Chant, The Magicians of Caprona, and Witch Week. In each of the four novels the central characters must identify their own talents and learn to make use of them—and of course, some of that talent is put to evil use, leading to conflict. A St. James Guide to Fantasy Writers essayist wrote: "That Jones manages to make civil servants interesting to the younger reader is a testimony to her skill; that she does this by boring her young heroes and heroines reinforces this." A Publishers Weekly reviewer praised the "exuberant momentum" of the Chrestomanci cycle.

The "Dalemark" series is a darker and more conventional fantasy, set in its own world. The titles Cart and Cwidder, Drowned Ammett, The Spellcoats, and The Crown of Dalemark are linked, but not chronologically. Some critics, however, have said this series seems intended for an older audience, as it proves "full of moral uncertainties but retaining the strong sense of adventure and tension," according to the St. James Guide to Fantasy Writers contributor.

Jones's many stand-alone novels reflect her comfort in both fantasy and science fiction. An essayist for the St. James Guide to Science Fiction Writers observed: "Given the fact … that the author herself dislikes genre categories, it should come as no surprise that many of her books deal with themes which, depending on whose eyes they're seen through, would count as science fiction, and a good half dozen of her novels have overt science fictional ideas." Still, the reviewer noted the prevailing theme: "Many of her characters, children and teenagers, through the course of the novel, learn more about their place in their world, or find a new and more appropriate place." Popular titles such as Sirius, Archer's Goon, A Sudden Wild Magic and Hex wood present otherworldly, sometimes intergalactic, communities as a means to explore social, emotional, and political conventions in the modern world. The St. James essayist concluded: "I like to think that for Wynne Jones, science fiction and fantasy are merely two convenient and arbitrary points on a continuum of fiction writing and that she writes as she wishes, and leaves it to others to decide. That would certainly be in keeping with the free literary spirit which pervades these … novels."

White concluded: "By reworking her own childhood emotions and experiences, Diana Wynne Jones has created lively, original fantasies built on a foundation of psychological realism. Her neglected young heroes always find personal strength and are usually left in the care of at least one loving adult. Because Jones writes for her own entertainment (and for that of the literature-starved child she once was), she is able to amuse her readers as well, even while challenging them to keep up with her fast-paced, convoluted plots."

In The Merlin Conspiracy Arianrhod (Roddy) is a young girl who meets Nick during a magical journey. Mark McCann, on the Web site of Australia's Sydney Morning Herald, called the book "a generous serve of pluriversal adventure and rejigged English mythology."

Jones told CA: "When I write for children, my first aim is to make a story—as amusing and exciting as possible—such as I wished I could have read as a child. My second aim is equally important. It is to give children—without presuming to instruct them—the benefit of my greater experience. I like to explore the private terrors and troubles which beset children, because they can thereby be shown they are not unique in misery. Children create about a third of their misery themselves. The other two-thirds is [sic] caused by adults—inconsiderate, mysterious, and often downright frightening adults. I put adults like this in my stories, in some firmly contemporary situation beset with very real problems, and explore the implications by means of magic and old myths. What I am after is an exciting—and exacting—wisdom, in which contemporary life and potent myth are intricately involved and superimposed. I would like children to discover that potent old truths are as much part of everyone's daily life as are—say—the days of the week."

BIOGRAPHICAL AND CRITICAL SOURCES:

BOOKS

Authors and Artists for Young Adults, Thomson Gale (Detroit, MI), 1989.

Dictionary of Literary Biography, Volume 161: British Children's Writers since 1960, Thomson Gale (Detroit, MI), 1996, pp. 225-232.

Holtze, Sally Holmes, editor, Fifth Book of Junior Authors, Wilson (New York, NY), pp. 166-167.

Reading for the Love of It: Best Books for Young Readers, Prentice-Hall (Englewood Cliffs, NJ), 1987.

St. James Guide to Fantasy Writers, St. James (Detroit, MI), 1996.

St. James Guide to Science Fiction Writers, 4th edition, St. James (Detroit, MI), 1996.

St. James Guide to Young Adult Writers, 2nd edition, St. James (Detroit, MI), 1999.

PERIODICALS

Booklist, October 15, 1984, p. 300; June 1, 1986, p. 1455; April 15, 1987, p. 1274; October 1, 1988, p. 320; January 1, 1990, p. 906; March 15, 1991, p. 1503; January 15, 1992, p. 873; March 15, 1992, pp. 1364, 1372; June 1, 1994, p. 1803; April 15, 2001, Michael Cart, "Fantasy Is Flourishing," p. 1546.

Book Window, spring, 1978.

British Book News Children's Books, winter, 1987, Fiona Lafferty, "Realms of Fantasy: An Interview with Diana Wynne Jones," pp. 2-5.

Bulletin of the Center for Children's Books, July-August, 1975.

Chicago Tribune Book World, November 4, 1982.

Globe and Mail (Toronto), July 12, 1986.

Growing Point, May, 1974; April, 1975; October, 1975; December, 1975; March, 1978; May, 1981; January, 1982; November, 1982; March, 1986, p. 4580; March, 1987, p. 4772; September, 1990, p. 5395; September, 1991, p. 5584.

Horn Book, August, 1980; January, 1985, p. 58; May, 1986, p. 331; March, 1988, p. 208; March, 1991, p. 206; May, 1994, p. 345; May, 2001, review of Mixed Magics: Four Tales of Chrestomanci, p. 327.

Junior Bookshelf, August 1979; August, 1980; October, 1981; February, 1982; December, 1982; February, 1986, p. 42; October, 1987, p. 235; October, 1990, p. 245; April, 1994, p. 69.

Los Angeles Times, January 31, 1987; September, 1990, p. 37.

New Statesman, May 24, 1974; May 20, 1977; October 10, 1986, p. 30.

New York Times Book Review, May 5, 1974; April 19, 1992, p. 16.

Observer, November 25, 1984, p. 27; December 1, 1985, p. 20; December 13, 1987, p. 22.

Publishers Weekly, February 22, 1991, Kit Alderdice, "Diana Wynne Jones," pp. 201-202; October 19, 1998, review of Dark Lord of Derkholm, p. 82; October 16, 2000, review of Year of the Griffin, p. 77; April 23, 2001, review of Mixed Magics, p. 79; "For Diana Wynne Jones Fans," p. 79.

School Librarian, June, 1978; December, 1982.

School Library Journal, April, 1974; April, 1978; September, 1988, p. 184; April, 1991, p. 141; October, 1991, p. 142; March, 1994, p. 236; July, 2001, Patricia A. Dollisch, review of Mixed Magics, p. 110.

Spectator, June 30, 1979.

Times (London), May 1, 1986.

Times Educational Supplement, November 18, 1977; November 30, 1979; April 18, 1980; November 23, 1984, p. 38; October 24, 1986, p. 24; February 5, 1988, p. 58; November 9, 1990, p. R11; November 8, 1991, p. 38.

Times Literary Supplement, March 12, 1970; April 6, 1973; July 5, 1974; April 4, 1975; July 11, 1975; April 2, 1976; March 25, 1977; April 7, 1978; March 28, 1980; September 19, 1980; March 25, 1981; March 27, 1981; November 20, 1981; July 23, 1982; October 19, 1984; November 29, 1985; January 31, 1986; December 12, 1986; November 20-26, 1987; July 12, 1991, p. 20.

Use of English, summer, 1983, Gillian Spraggs, "True Dreams: The Fantasy Fiction of Diana Wynne Jones," pp. 17-22.

U.S. News and World Report, November 29, 1999, Holly J. Morris, "Mad about Harry? Try Diana," p. 80.

Washington Post Book World, May 13, 1984; May 12, 1985; May 11, 1986; June 14, 1987; November 8, 1987; February 11, 1990, p. 12; May 13, 1990, p. 18; May 12, 1991, p. 14; May 8, 1994, pp. 17, 19.

World of Children's Books, spring, 1978.

ONLINE

Sydney Morning Herald Web site, http://www.smh.com.au/ (May 24, 2003), Mark McCann, review of The Merlin Conspiracy.