Rosemary Sutcliff was an internationally renowned writer of historical novels, for children, young adults and adults. She also wrote stories for children. This category compiles the posts on this blog by title.
Of the 1961 cover of Rosemary Sutcliff’s ‘classic’ historical novel Dawn Wind Katherine Langrish writes: ” It looks more modern, perhaps because Charles Keeping, who illustrated nearly all her books, was such a strong and innovative artist. In fact, the art here is almost more important than the title, and the author’s own name all but fades into the dark shadows at the children’s feet. Read More »
The Crawdad Hole has a long post on Sword Song – I have not found this to be written about as much by readers. I love the book because I transcribed it from Rosemary Sutcliff‘s hand-written draft manuscript left on her desk when she died suddenly in 1992. Her long-time editor Jill Black finalised it for publication.
In The Roundabout Horse, Rosemary Sutcliff’s illustrated children’s story, Sunflower is a special roundabout horse. Although he is made from wood, he has real feelings. Jenny is special. When she rides Sunflower, something magical happens both to him and to her. I love this short children’s story from Rosemary, and my children did too when they were young.
From The Bookbanter Blog a 2008 reviewof the Rosemary Sutcliff book, a best-selling historical novel for adults, Sword at Sunset which is about King Arthur. It is one of several books by Rosemary Sutcliff about Arthur.
Sutcliff’s early medieval world is not as ‘dark age’ as normally depicted in fiction, but thriving with trade and societal infrastructure across Europe still seemingly intact. Artos the Bear spends the beginning of the book traveling to southern France where he looks to purchase strong breeds of horses to bring back to Britain to create a strong cavalry force to fight against the invading Anglo Saxons and maintain the British control and rule.
An early unpublished book was called Wild Sunrise. It was about the Roman invasion of Britain told from the British viewpoint. The hero was Cradoc, a name Rosemary used later in The Eagle of the Ninth and in Sun Horse, Moon Horse. (Her father, who I knew as Uncle George, had a naval hero called Admiral Sir Christopher Cradock, who went down with his flagship at the battle of Coronel in 1914). Wild Sunrise disappeared, which was as well, she said in her memoir Blue Remembered Hills (1983), ‘because so much of me was in it, naked and defenceless’
Source: Oxford Dictionary of National Biography. Article on Rosemary by Gilian Avery
ROSEMARY SUTCLIFF (1920-92) 