Hammick, Georgina 1939-

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HAMMICK, Georgina 1939-

PERSONAL: Born May 24, 1939, in Hampshire, England; daughter of George Douglas (an army officer) and Patricia (a housewife; maiden name, Marsh) Heyman; married Charles C. W. Hammick, October 24, 1961 (divorced, 1983); children: Thomas, Kate, Rose. Ethnicity: British. Education: Attended Academie Julian, Paris, 1956-57; attended Salisbury School of Art, 1957-58. Politics: Social democrat. Religion: Anglican. Hobbies and other interests: Gardening, wild life (especially birds), walking.

ADDRESSES: Home—Bridgewalk House, Brixton Deverill, Warminster, Wiltshire BA12 7EJ, England. Agent—Rachel Calder, Sayle Literary Agency, Bickerton House 25-27 Bickerton Rd., London N19 5JT, England.

CAREER: Teacher of English and art, 1959-61; worked at Hammicks Bookshops Ltd., beginning in 1968, became director, 1970-80; tutor in creative writing and writer-in-school, 1980—. Served on panels of Literature Southern Arts, Greater London Arts, and English PEN.

MEMBER: Writers Guild of Great Britain, Authors Lending and Copyright Society, National Trust, English PEN, Royal Society of Literature.

AWARDS, HONORS: Shortlisted for Whitbread Award for first novel, 1996; Royal Society of Literature fellow, 2001; Society of Authors' Travel Scholarship.

WRITINGS:

(With Angus Nicolson, Valerie Owen, and others) A Poetry Quintet, Gollancz (London, England), 1976.

People for Lunch (short stories), Methuen (London, England), 1987.

Spoilt, Chatto & Windus (London, England), 1992.

(Editor) The Virago Book of Love & Loss: Stories of the Heart, Virago Press (London, England), 1992.

The Arizona Game, Chatto & Windus (London, England), 1996.

Green Man Running, Chatto & Windus (London, England), 2002.

Contributor of short stories to anthologies, including Best of Fiction Magazine, Best Short Stories, 1987, Best Short Stories, 1988, and Best Short Stories from Stand, and in magazines, including Fiction, Stand, Listener, Critical Quarterly, and Woman's Journal.

Author of garden column in Books.

SIDELIGHTS: Georgina Hammick's first two books of short stories, People for Lunch and Spoilt, are what her "considerable reputation rests upon," according to the Reader's Guide to Twentieth-Century Writers, which also described Hammmick's stories as "distinguished by unobtrusive craftsmanship, and the quest for the exact work."

Debra West-Maciaszek of Studies in Short Fiction praised Hammick for her choice of pieces in the anthology Love & Loss: Stories of the Heart that do not reflect "Harlequin romances, but writing by women that is powerful, tight and multidimensional." A reviewer for Publishers Weekly described it as a "solid, durable anthology."

Hammick's first novel, The Arizona Game, earned praise from Richmond Review contributor Sara Rance for fulfilling the "promise of her short stories." Daily Telegraph writer Abigail Willis also praised Hammick for having produced in Green Man Running "a shrewd, tender look at human contrariness and the cowardly things we sometimes do to feel better about ourselves." Jessica Mann of the Sunday Telegraph commented on Hammick's "originality and wit," but also remarked that "her undeniable brilliance seems diluted in a full-length novel."

Hammick once told CA: "Authors who have influenced my writing include George Eliot, Virginia Woolf, Katherine Mansfield, Anton Chekhov, Elizabeth Bowen, Elizabeth Bishop, Elizabeth Taylor (the writer, not the actress!), Raymond Carver, Alice Munro, Ellen Gilchrist, and John Cheever. My working habits are slow. I am constantly revising drafts—five or six for each story. My advice to students is to read and to keep reading."

BIOGRAPHICAL AND CRITICAL SOURCES:

BOOKS

Parker, Peter, editor, A Reader's Guide to Twentieth-Century Writers, Oxford University Press (New York, NY), 1996, pp. 303-304.

PERIODICALS

Daily Telegraph (London, England), February 16, 2002, Abigail Willis, review of Green Man Running.

Publishers Weekly, August 31, 1992, review of The Virago Book of Love & Loss: Stories of the Heart, p. 65.

Spectator (London, England), July 11, 1992, Candida Crewe, review of Spoilt, p. 32; August 17, 1996, Anita Brookner, review of The Arizona Game, p. 25.

Studies in Short Fiction, Debra L. West-Maciaszek, review of The Virago Book of Love & Loss, p. 517.

Sunday Observer (London, England), February 10, 2002, Justine Ettler, review of Green Man Running.

Sunday Telegraph (London, England), February 17, 2002, Jessica Mann, review of Green Man Running.

Sunday Times (London, England), review of Green Man Running, p. 296.

Times Literary Supplement, July 24, 1992, Abigail Levene, review of Spoilt, p. 21; December 4, 1992, Ana Nicholls, review of The Virago Book of Love & Loss, p. 24; March 1, 2002, Sarah Curtis, review of Green Man Running, p. 23.