Barbara Pym
Barbara Mary Crampton Pym was a British novelist celebrated for her comic portrayals of English life.
Educated at Oxford's St Hilda's College, she served in the Women's Royal Naval Service during World War II. After publishing six novels between 1950 and 1961, her career stalled when publishers rejected her seventh manuscript.
Her revival came in 1975 when Philip Larkin and Lord David Cecil named her the century's most underrated writer.
Her subsequent novel, Quartet in Autumn, earned a Booker Prize nomination.
Pym's work at the International African Institute inspired recurring anthropologist characters throughout her novels.
She never married and lived her later years in Oxfordshire with her sister.
