Oneta Malorie BlackmanOBE,FRSL (born 8 February 1962) is a British writer who held the position ofChildren's Laureate from 2013 to 2015. She primarily writes literature and television drama for children and young adults. She has used science fiction to explore social and ethical issues, for example, herNoughts and Crosses series uses the setting of a fictional alternative Britain to explore racism. Blackman has been the recipient of many honours for her work, including the 2022PEN Pinter Prize.
Malorie Blackman was born on 8 February 1962[2] inMerton,London, England, and she grew up inLewisham, one of five siblings. Her parents were both fromBarbados and had come to Britain as part of the "Windrush generation"; her father Joe was a bus driver and her mother Ruby worked in a pyjama factory.[3] Blackman's father walked out on the family while she was young, leaving her mother to single-handedly raise her and her siblings. At school, Malorie wanted to be an English teacher, but she grew up to become asystems programmer instead.[4][5]
Since the 1980s, Blackman began attending various courses atCity Lit adult education college,[7][8] and in 2019, City Lit announced the Malorie Blackman OBE "Unheard Voices" Creative Writing Scholarships, providing three annual awards worth up to £1000 each to fund study within the City Lit Creative Writing department.[9]
Blackman's first book wasNot So Stupid!, a collection ofhorror and science fiction stories for young adults, published in November 1990.[10][11] Since then, she has written more than 60 children's books, including novels and short-story collections, and also televisionscripts and astage play.[12] She also became the firstperson of colour writer to work onDoctor Who in 2018.[13]
Blackman's award-winningNoughts & Crosses series (beginning in 2001), exploring love, racism, and violence, is set in a fictional alternative Britain. Explaining her choice of title, in a 2007 interview for theBBC'sBlast website, Blackman said thatnoughts and crosses is "one of those games that nobody ever plays after childhood, because nobody ever wins".[14] In an interview forThe Times, Blackman said that before writingNoughts & Crosses, herprotagonists'ethnicities had never been central to the plots of her books.[5] She has also said: "I wanted to show black children just getting on with their lives, having adventures, and solving their dilemmas, like the characters in all the books I read as a child."[4]
Blackman eventually decided to address racism directly.[5][14] She reused some details from her own experience, including an occasion when she needed aplaster and found they were designed to be inconspicuous only on white people's skin.[5]The Times interviewerAmanda Craig speculated about the delay for theNoughts & Crosses series to be published in the United States: "though there was considerable interest, 9/11 killed off the possibility of publishing any book describing what might drive someone to become a terrorist".[5]Noughts and Crosses later became available in the US, published under the titleBlack & White (Simon & Schuster Publishers, 2005).
Noughts & Crosses was No. 61 on theBig Read list, a 2003 BBC survey to find "The Nation's Best-Loved Book".[15]
Her work has won more than 15 awards.[12][18] Blackman's television scripts include episodes of the long-running children's dramaByker Grove as well as television adaptations of her novelsWhizziwig andPig-Heart Boy.[12] Her books have been translated into more than 15 languages, includingSpanish,Welsh,German,Japanese,Chinese andFrench.
In June 2013, Blackman was announced as the newChildren's Laureate, succeedingJulia Donaldson.[19][20] Blackman helped set up the first UK Young Adult Literature Convention (YALC) during her time as Children's Laureate.[21]
In 2022, Blackman was chosen as winner of thePEN Pinter Prize, becoming the first author of children's and Young Adult books to receive the accolade.[22][23][24] In her acceptance address at theBritish Library in October 2022, she named DrAbduljalil Al-Singace as the International Writer of Courage with whom she would share the prize.[25]
In November 2023, the exhibitionMalorie Blackman: The Power of Stories opened at the British Library (on show until 25 February 2024), celebrating and contextualizing her career.[26][27][28] As described byWallpaper magazine, it "shines a light on Blackman's journey as an author, while touching upon social issues represented in her novels.... The landmark exhibition ... is an open invitation to learn about the importance of media representation, and Black activism throughout the 1960s to 1980s."[29]
Malorie Blackman lives with her husband Neil and daughter Elizabeth inKent, England. In her free time, she likes to play her piano, compose, play computer games and write poetry.[30] She is the subject of a biography for children byVerna Wilkins.[31]
In March 2014, Blackman joined other prominent authors in supporting theLet Books Be Books campaign, which seeks to stop children's books being labelled as "for girls" or "for boys".[32]
Blackman's memoirJust Sayin': My Life In Words was published by#Merky Books in 2022. She has said it was "the hardest thing I've ever written… Because I didn't make it up, did I? It’s all true! I had to revisit past events, dig deep into memories…"[37] It was summed up byPatrice Lawrence as "a book about survival and success".[38] The review in theTimes Literary Supplement said that Blackman "offers 'a skip and a trip' through the years, writing with candour and humour."[39]
Unheard Voices: An Anthology of Stories and Poems to Commemorate the Bicentenary Anniversary of the Abolition of the Slave Trade, ed. Malorie Blackman, Corgi Children's, 2007,ISBN0-552-55600-9
"Humming Through My Fingers" in the multi-author collectionShining On: A Collection of Stories in Aid of the Teen Cancer Trust, Picadilly Press, 2006,ISBN1-85340-893-X
Short story in the multi-author collectionThe Crew and Other Teen Fiction, Heinemann Library,ISBN0-431-01875-8
"Peacemaker" in the multi-author collectionPeacemaker and Other Stories (illustrated by Peter Richardson and David Hine),Heinemann Educational, 1999,ISBN0-435-11600-2
^abcBlackman, Malorie (1995–2007)."Malorie Blackman".Penguin UK Authors. Penguin Books PLC. Archived fromthe original on 19 April 2007. Retrieved23 March 2007.
^Also published as4u2read.ok Hostage, Barrington Stoke, 2002,ISBN1-84299-056-X, and as a "Close Look, Quick Look" photocopiable version for teachers, Barrington Stoke, 2004,ISBN1-84299-236-8.
^Originally published separately asWhizziwig, 1995, andWhizzywhig Returns, 1999
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