Elspeth Huxley CBE | |
|---|---|
| Born | Elspeth Grant (1907-07-23)23 July 1907 London[1] |
| Died | 10 January 1997(1997-01-10) (aged 89) Tetbury, Gloucestershire, England |
| Occupation | Author, journalist, broadcaster, magistrate, environmentalist, farmer, and government adviser |
| Nationality | British |
| Alma mater | Reading University,Cornell University |
| Subject | Settler life in British Kenya |
| Notable works | The Flame Trees of Thika,The Mottled Lizard |
| Spouse | Gervas Huxley |
| Relatives | Huxley family |
Elspeth Joscelin HuxleyCBE (née Grant; 23 July 1907 – 10 January 1997)[1] was an English writer, journalist, broadcaster, magistrate, environmentalist, farmer, and government adviser.[2] She wrote over 40 books, including her best-known lyrical books,The Flame Trees of Thika andThe Mottled Lizard, based on her youth in a coffee farm inBritish Kenya. Her husband,Gervas Huxley, was a grandson ofThomas Henry Huxley and a cousin ofAldous Huxley.[3]
Nellie and Major Josceline Grant, Elspeth's parents, arrived inThika in what was thenBritish East Africa in 1912, to start a life as coffee farmers incolonial Kenya. Elspeth, aged six, arrived in December 1913, complete with governess and maid.[4] Her upbringing was unconventional; she was "almost treated as a parcel, being passed from hand to hand".[4] Huxley's 1959 bookThe Flame Trees of Thika explores how unprepared for rustic life the early British settlers really were. It was adapted intoa television miniseries in 1981. Elspeth was educated at a whites-only school inNairobi.
She left Africa in 1925, earning a degree in agriculture atReading University in England and studying atCornell University inupstate New York.[2] She returned to Africa periodically.
Huxley was appointed Assistant Press Officer to theEmpire Marketing Board in 1929. She resigned her post in 1932 and travelled widely. Huxley started writing soon after her marriage; her first book,White Man's Country:Lord Delamere and the making of Kenya about the famous white settler, was published in 1935.
Huxley's 1939 bookRed Strangers describes life among theKikuyu of Kenya around the time of the arrival of the first European settlers. The manuscript was sent first to the publisherMacmillan, butHarold Macmillan, then working for the family firm, agreed to publish it only with considerable cuts, including a graphic description offemale circumcision. Huxley refused, and the book was published byChatto & Windus. Huxley remembered: "It was indeed a happy day for me when our future Prime Minister couldn't takeclitoridectomy."[4] The book was republished by Penguin Books in 1999 and again byPenguin Classics in 2000;Richard Dawkins played an important role in getting the book republished, and wrote a preface to the new edition.
Her final tally of 42[4] books included the ten works of fiction and 29 non-fiction books, as well as thousands of pamphlets and articles.[5]
During the Second World War, Huxley was a broadcaster for the BBC.[4]
In 1960, Huxley was appointed an independent member of the Advisory Commission for the Review of the Constitution of theFederation of Rhodesia and Nyasaland (theMonckton Commission). Although she was initially an advocate of continuedcolonial rule, she later called for the independence of African nations.[3]
In the 1960s, she served as a correspondent for theNational Review magazine.
Huxley was a friend ofJoy Adamson,[3] the author ofBorn Free, and is mentioned in the biography of Joy andGeorge Adamson entitledThe Great Safari. Huxley wrote the foreword to Joy's autobiographyThe Searching Spirit.
She married Gervas Huxley, the son of doctor Henry Huxley (1865–1946) in 1931.[6] They had one son, Charles, who was born in February 1944.
Huxley died on 10 January 1997 aged 89, in a nursing home atTetbury in Gloucestershire, England.[2]
A collection of twelve boxes of photographs, prints, negatives, contact prints and slides is held atBristol Archives in theBritish Empire and Commonwealth Collection. Most of the photographs were taken by Huxley, with the rest collected by her. The collection covers Huxley's whole career (1896-1981) and subject matter includesKenyan safari landscapes and local people (specifically theKikuyu people), theMau Mau uprising, white settlers, EdwardianMombasa, and a transcript of an oral history interview taken by the British Empire and Commonwealth Museum (Ref. 1995/076).[7] Other collections related to Huxley can be found at theBodleian Library andCambridge University Library Department of Manuscripts and University Archives.[8]
Christine S. Nicholls wroteElspeth Huxley: A Biography, published by Harper Collins in 2002.
