Dorothy L. Sayers: Her Life and Soul [Paperback]

Barbara Reynolds (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: March 15, 1997

Mystery writer Dorothy Sayers is loved and remembered, most notably, for the creation of sleuths Lord Peter Wimsey and Harriet Vane. As this biography attests, Sayers was also one of the first women to be awarded a degree from Oxford, a playwright, and an essayist--but also a woman with personal joys and tragedies. Here, Reynolds, a close friend of Sayers, presents a convincing and balanced portrait of one of the 20th century's most brilliant, creative women. 30 b&w photos.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

Sayers, The Passionate Intellect of Reynolds's earlier book, is revealed as a more exciting person in this biography, published in observance of the centenary of the writer's birth. As the author of sophisticated mysteries featuring Lord Peter Wimsey, aristocratic detective, and feminist Harriet Vane, Sayers gained fame during the l920s; she was also among the first women to earn a degree from Oxford, and when she died in l957 at the age of 64 she was involved in translating Dante's Divine Comedy . She was religious as well as scholarly and expressed her Christian beliefs in stage and radio dramas. Sayers had a sense of humor and countless interests, from music to motorcycling. But she also suffered from failed love affairs and from secretly bearing a son out of wedlock in the intolerant moral climate of her day. Excerpts from her correspondence and publications illuminate Reynolds's discerning depiction of this intriguing woman. Photos.
Copyright 1993 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

From Kirkus Reviews

Another ``interim report'' on the life (1893-1957) of the creator of Lord Peter Wimsey and reluctant Christian apologist, by a longtime friend, completer of Sayers's translation of Dante and author of The Passionate Intellect: Dorothy L. Sayers' Encounter with Dante (1989- -not reviewed). The problem all Sayers's biographers face is to reconcile her early career as a pioneer and leading theorist of the formal detective story with the religious plays, essays, and lectures to which she committed her last 15 years. In the absence of a collected edition of Sayers's letters, Reynolds still tries to make Sayers speak for herself whenever possible by quoting letters, conversations, and passages from her voluminous writings. The result is a view of the writer that Sayers herself would likely have approved of: as a generous, fiercely intelligent woman whose cardinal passion, her intellectual ardor, led her from Oxford to the hand-to-mouth London bohemianism that spawned the inimitably foppish Wimsey and then, quite logically, to a defense of the writer's imagination (The Mind of the Maker) that set forth Sayers's understanding of the Trinity. Despite some stiffness in the early chapters, and a disinclination to criticize her subject even mildly, Reynolds captures the ardent nature that sustained Sayers through her unrequited love affairs, her pregnancy without marriage, her lifelong support of the son she never publicly acknowledged, and the writing she felt certain from the beginning was her vocation. It isn't until the popular Wimsey books are behind, though, that Reynolds's matching passion comes out--she calls The Mind of the Maker and The Man Born to Be King Sayers's ``two greatest works''--and the biography comes into its own, even though only a few years of Sayers's life remain before Reynolds encounters the preemptive shadow of her own earlier book. Best, then, on the later years--the years of her own friendship with Sayers--that Reynolds has already described so sympathetically. Fans of Lord Peter may feel let down. (Thirty b&w photographs) -- Copyright ©1993, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

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Product Details

• Paperback: 416 pages
• Publisher: St. Martin's Press (March 15, 1997)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0312153538
• ISBN-13: 978-0312153533
• Product Dimensions: 9 x 6.1 x 1.2 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.4 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (4 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #774,506 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Most Helpful Customer Reviews

42 of 42 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Anything But Whimsical, February 27, 2002

By 

Author Bill Peschel "Writers Gone Wild" (Hershey, PA USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Dorothy L. Sayers: Her Life and Soul (Paperback)

Dorothy L. Sayers did more in her life than just create the aristocratic detective Lord Peter Wimsey. In addition to writing the Wimsey novels and short stories, she was one of the first female graduates of Oxford, a translator of Dante, a poet and a Christian apologist whose reputation at the time rivaled that of C.S. Lewis.

Her longtime friend, Barbara Reynolds, draws on her memories of the woman as well as her voluminous correspondence and has written a lively account of Sayers' life.

Those who admire the Wimsey novels will find their enjoyment heightened after reading this book. As I found in researching the "Annotating Dorothy L. Sayers"..., Sayers flooded her work with literary, historical and social references that represented the best of her education as well as her interests in the murderous and the macabre: Shakespeare, John Donne, Greek mythology, contemporary English music-hall acts, Gilbert & Sullivan, notorious 19th-century murders and snippets of classical Greek and Latin. To write "The Nine Tailors," which featured a church and its bell-ringers, Sayers spent two years studying campanology, and had to endure, she wrote, "incalculable hours spent in writing out sheets and sheets of changes, until I could do any method accurately in my head. Also, I had to visualize, from the pages of instructions to ringers, both what it looked like and what it felt like to handle a bell and to acquire rope-sight.'" After the novel was published, she thought she had been caught out on only three small technical errors, but did well enough to be asked to serve as vice-president of the Campanological Society of Great Britain.

But the books also contain much of Sayers herself. Obviously, Sayers' alter ego was expressed in the character of Harriet Vane, the mystery writer she put on trial for murder in "Strong Poison," who was romanced by Peter in "Gaudy Night," and who married him in "Busman's Honeymoon." But Sayers also drew on her life experiences and her interests. "Gaudy Night" reflected her experiences at Oxford, her desire to live the scholarly life and the importance of intellectual achievement, while the parsonage she vividly recreated in "The Nine Tailors" was drawn from her childhood memories, and the gentle churchly Rev. Thomas Venables was modeled on her parson father.

Christianity played a great role in Sayers' life from the start, and the success of the Wimsey novels enabled her to shelve the detective and turn to writing plays and books that expounded the doctrine of the Church of England in laymen's terms. In this, she was enormously successful, and even sparked a ruckus when one of her plays featured the disciples talking in modern slang, predating the uproar over "Jesus Christ Superstar" by three decades.

Reynolds also tells the story of the illegitimate child Sayers bore. While it would be easy to condemn her for turning the boy over to a cousin to raise, Reynolds also made clear that Sayers did it to protect her parents, who she thought would be terribly hurt by her misjudgment. Considering that she visited and paid for his upkeep and education, and told him the whole story when he was an adult, it seems to have been the best of all possible choices.

The pleasure of meeting Miss Sayers can only be increased by looking into her letters, which have been published in several volumes. From the first, Sayers seems to have been bright, precocious and determined to make her own way, and it's a pleasure to see in Reynolds' biography that she did so splendidly.

16 of 18 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars My New Friend Dorothy, August 15, 2004

By 

Margaret Brown "menapausal book monger" (Portland Oregon) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Dorothy L. Sayers: Her Life and Soul (Paperback)

I had barely even heard of Dorothy Sayers before reading this biography. Now I feel like I have a life long friend. From her idealic childhood and education, to her fiery personality to her insatialble intellect, I was enthralled. Her love of Wilkie Collins and Dante give a glimpse into the expanse of her mind and the breadth of topics she wrote on showed the expanse of her talent. I was especially moved by her love and committement to her country in time of war-inspiring. Her personal life was usually a shambles but so it seems to go with women of such brilliance. If you love liturature you will love this biography!

14 of 16 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars One of the most beautiful biographies I have ever read!, March 31, 2003

By 

Christiana Washington (Colorado) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Dorothy L. Sayers: Her Life and Soul (Paperback)

An amazing look at the life of this incredible Christian woman! This book dives into the depths of her mind and her life. No secret or interesting fact is spared in this delightful biography. I recommend it to anyone interested in the life of this fascinating visionary.