Maggie Gee

Who is Maggie Gee?

Maggie Mary Gee OBE FRSL is an English novelist. She was born in Poole, Dorset, then moved to the Midlands and later to Sussex. She was educated at state schools and at Somerville College, Oxford. She later worked in publishing and then had a research post at Wolverhampton Polytechnic where she completed a doctorate in the twentieth-century novel in 1980. In 2012 she became a Professor of Creative Writing at Bath Spa University.

Gee was one of six women among the 20 writers on the Granta Best of Young British Novelists list in 1983, which she recalls as "a very good time for fiction". She has written eleven novels and a collection of short stories, and was the first female Chair of the Royal Society of Literature, 2004-2008. She is now one of the Vice-Presidents of the RSL, Visiting Professor of Creative Writing at Sheffield Hallam University and Professor of Creative Writing at Bath Spa University where she shares an office with Professor Fay Weldon. She has also served on the Society of Authors' management committee and the government's Public Lending Right committee. Her seventh novel, The White Family, was shortlisted for the 2003 Orange Prize and the International IMPAC Dublin Literary Award.