Stevie Davies


Stevie Davies is a Welsh novelist, essayist and short story writer. She was elected a fellow of the Royal Society of Literature in 1998, and is also a fellow of the Welsh Academy. Her novel The Element of Water was longlisted for the Booker Prize in 2001, and won the Wales Book of the Year in 2002.

Early life

Stevie Davies was born in Salisbury, England, but lived in Wales from when she was a week old. The Davies family lived in Morriston, a large town located within the city of Swansea. The only child of an RAF officer, Davies left Wales at the age of two and spent a nomadic childhood in Egypt, Germany and Scotland in the 1950s. After studying at the University of Manchester, Davies went on to lecture in the English department there. Concurrently she married Douglas Brooks another lecturer at Manchester who adopted the name Douglas Brooks-Davies.

Career

Davies has published widely in the fields of fiction, literary criticism, biography and popular history. Her non-fiction work includes titles on the Brontë family, John Milton and Henry Vaughan. Davies' first novel, Boy Blue, was published by The Women's Press in 1987, and won the Fawcett Society Book Prize later that year. In 2001, Davies' novel The Element of Water was longlisted for the Booker Prize. It went on to win the 2002 Arts Council of Wales Book of the Year award.

Personal life

Davies has three grown children, a son and two daughters. She is Professor of Creative Writing at Swansea University, and lives in Mumbles.

Publications

Fiction