Royce Watson posted at the Rosemary Sutcliff page on Facebook a picture he took a few years ago when he was on holiday in Scotland. He wrote:”It’s the footprint on the coronation stone at Dunadd Fort, as mentioned in the book (The Eagle of the Ninth). Enjoyed the book, big fan.” Eagle eyed Anne, who is, to my shame, much sharper-eyed and more knowledgeable than I on most matters Rosemary, corrects us both, that it’s in The Mark of the Horse Lord in a Dal Riada coronation ceremony.
Category: The Mark of the Horse Lord
Posts at www.rosemarysutclif.com about The Mark of the Horse Lord, historical novel by Rosemary Sutcliff (1920-92)
Did The Eagle of the Ninth historical novelist Rosemary Sutcliff want to be a romantic novelist?
Rosemary Sutcliff‘s life and work in children’s, young adult, and adult literature, including The Eagle of the Ninth, was commented upon in 2003 by one of her editors on a website which I cannot now find (and I posted this first in April last year, 2010). She did have a “mystical communion with the past”, an “uncanny sense of place” and a rude sense of humour. But she certainly did not aspire to being a romantic novelist with books “full of sex”. Nor did she feel she had been “let down” by being “crippled by Stills disease”. And her best work was not only in the first half of her career; she had award-winning books up to the end of her life.
She wrote fine books after the 1950s and 1960s, for example the award-winning Song for a Dark Queen in the 1970s, The Shining Company in the 1980s (which won The USA’s Phoenix Award in 2010), and even her last manuscript Sword Song which was published after her death in the 1990s.Read More »
Rosemary Sutcliff won The Carnegie Medal for historical novel The Lantern Bearers in 1959
Rosemary Sutcliff’s historical novels The Eagle of the Ninth, The Silver Branch, and The Lantern Bearers are sometimes called a trilogy. Rosemary Sutcliff won the Library Association Carnegie Medal for The Lantern Bearers in 1959. The Medal is awarded every year in the UK to the writer of an outstanding book for children. The Library Association started the prize in 1936, in memory of the Scottish-born philanthropist Andrew Carnegie (1835-1919), a self-made industrialist who made his fortune in steel in the USA. His experience of using a library as a child led him to resolve that “if ever wealth came to me that it should be used to establish free libraries”. He established more than 2800 libraries across the English speaking world and, by the time of his death, over half the library authorities in Great Britain had Carnegie libraries.
First awarded to Arthur Ransome for Pigeon Post, the medal is now awarded by the Chartered Institute of Library and Information Professionals. The winner receives a golden medal and some £500 worth of books to donate to a library of their choice. Rosemary Sutcliff also:
- Was runner-up for Carnegie Medal for Tristan and Iseult in 1972
- Won the Boston-Globe Horn Book Award for Tristan and Iseult in 1972
- Was highly commended by the Hans Christian Andersen Award in 1974
- Won The Other Award for Song for a Dark Queen in 1978
- Won The Phoenix Children’s Book Award for The Mark of the Horse Lord in 1985, and The Shining Company in 2010
Book Awards won by Rosemary Sutcliff
I am trying to make accurate my list of all book awards Rosemary Sutcliff was given or nominated for. This is my summary so far: can readers help me expand and improve it?
- 1959: The Carnegie Medal, The Lantern Bearers
- 1968: The Hans Christian Andersen Award, nominated
- 1971: Zilveren Griffel – The Silver Pencil, in Holland
- 1972: The Boston Globe-Horn Book Award, Tristan and Iseult
- 1974: The Hans Christian Andersen Award, highly commended
- 1978: The Other Award, Song for a Dark Queen (A children’s book award focusing on anti-sexist, anti-racist titles in the UK).
- 1985: The Phoenix Award, The Mark of the Horse Lord
- 2010: The Phoenix Award, The Shining Company
Rosemary Sutcliff The Mark of the Horse Lord | Read with A Chair, A Fireplace, A Tea Cozy | Review of the Week
The Mark of the Horse Lord about Phaedrus, a gladiator in second century Britain, was one of The Eagle of the Ninth author Rosemary Sutcliff’s many award-winning historical novels and children’s books. Blogger Liz B, who ‘like Buffy’ just wants ‘a chair, a fireplace, a tea cozy, and to talk about stories’ invites us to ‘pull up a chair, have a cup of tea’ and love the Read More »
ROSEMARY SUTCLIFF (1920-92) 