Emma Tennant (1) (1937–2017)

Emma Tennant was born in London, England, to an aristocratic family of Scottish origins. Her parents were Christopher Grey Tennant, 2nd Baron Glenconner, and Elizabeth, Lady Glenconner. She was a half-sister of Colin Tennant, later 3rd Baron Glenconner, and a niece of socialite Stephen Tennant. She split her childhood between the family's mock-baronial manor house The Glen near Peebles, in the Scottish Borders, and London. She was educated at St. Paul's Girls' School in London and an Oxford finishing school, before coming out as a debutante in 1956. Tennant worked as a travel writer for Queen magazine and an editor for Vogue. She published her debut novel, The Colour of Rain, at age 25 under the pseudonym Catherine Aydy. After Italian novelist Alberto Moravia disparaged the book, she suffered from writer's block for nearly 10 years. Finally in 1973, she published her second novel The Time of the Crack, and a large number of books followed, which included fantasy, science fiction, thrillers, comedies, and children's books. In 1975, she founded Bananas, an irreverent literary magazine, which helped launch the careers of several young novelists, and served as its editor for three years. She also was the editor of the Viking series Lives of Modern Women.

In later years, she began to write about her own life, publishing four volumes of memoirs that included Girlitude and Burnt Diaries (both 1999). She also wrote sequels with a feminist twist to some classic British novels, including The French Dancer's Bastard (2006), which recounted the life of Adèle, the daughter of Mr. Rochester from Jane Eyre; An Unequal Marriage: Or, Pride and Prejudice Twenty Years Later (1994); and Two Women of London: The Strange Case of Ms. Jekyll and Mrs. Hyde (1989). Tennant was married four times and had three children, including her son Matthew Yorke, also a writer.