Diana Athill

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During the years of the mid-twentieth century that she worked in publishing, DA herself published translations, short stories, and a novel. She is, however, best-known for her several volumes of memoirs (one of them a collection of letters), which present both her professional and her personal life with artistry, feeling, and with unusual candour.
Photo of Diana Athill, seated, in Toronto to be interviewed by Alice Munro at the Inernational Festival of Authors, 20 October            2009.
"Diana Athill" by David Cooper, 2009-10-02. Retrieved from https://www.gettyimages.co.uk/detail/news-photo/oct-20-2009-feature-photo-of-diana-athill-92-year-old-u-k-news-photo/164998101. This image is licensed under the GETTY IMAGES CONTENT LICENCE AGREEMENT.

Milestones

December 21, 1917
DA was born in Kensington during an air-raid on London by German Zeppelins. She was the eldest of three: older than her brother, Andrew, by two years and her sister, Patience, by five.
Jack, Ian, and Diana Athill. “Introduction”. Life Class. The Selected Memoirs of Diana Athill, Granta, 2009, p. vii - xviii.
xviii
“Contemporary Authors”. Gale Databases: Literature Resource Centre-LRC.
Athill, Diana. Life Class: The Selected Memoirs of Diana Athill. Granta, 2009.
184, 116
By 11 August 2000
DA entitled her book about her own professional career Stet: the Latin word meaning let it stand which is used by proof-readers to signify that some suggested or expected change is not to be made.
TLS Centenary Archive Centenary Archive [1902-2012].
5080 (11 August 2000): 36
OCLC WorldCat.
3 November 2016
DA 's last book, A Florence Diary, was reworked out of an earlier account (written for her mother) of a visit to Florence in 1947, when Europe was emerging back into peacetime life from the survival mode of war.
Blackwell’s Online Bookshop.
23 January 2019
DA died in her retirement home at Highgate in north London, aged one hundred and one.
Pattullo, Polly. “Diana Athill Obituary”. theguardian.com.

Biography

Birth

December 21, 1917
DA was born in Kensington during an air-raid on London by German Zeppelins. She was the eldest of three: older than her brother, Andrew, by two years and her sister, Patience, by five.
Jack, Ian, and Diana Athill. “Introduction”. Life Class. The Selected Memoirs of Diana Athill, Granta, 2009, p. vii - xviii.
xviii
“Contemporary Authors”. Gale Databases: Literature Resource Centre-LRC.
Athill, Diana. Life Class: The Selected Memoirs of Diana Athill. Granta, 2009.
184, 116