Penelope Mortimer

Penelope Ruth Mortimer (née Fletcher; 19 September 1918 – 19 October 1999) was a Welsh-born English journalist, biographer, and novelist. Her semi-autobiographical novel The Pumpkin Eater (1962) was made into a 1964 film of the same name. It starred Anne Bancroft, who was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Actress for her performance as Jo Armitage, a character based on Mortimer herself. Personal life Mortimer was born Penelope Ruth Fletcher in Rhyl, Flintshire (now Denbighshire), Wales, the younger daughter of Amy Caroline Fletcher and the Rev A. F. G. Fletcher, an Anglican clergyman. Her father had lost his faith and used the parish magazine to celebrate Soviet persecution of the Russian Orthodox Church. He abused her sexually. Mortimer later wrote of her father, "I think he was a clergyman for one reason only; there was nothing else – as Nellie Fletcher's second son – he could possibly have been! As a small boy, bullied and teased by six sisters and four brothers, he sat under the nursery table chanting 'Mama, papa, all the children are disagreeable except me', to the tune of Gentle Jesus'." Her father frequently changed his parish and she attended numerous schools. She was educated at Croydon High School, the New School, Streatham, Blencathra, Rhyl Garden School, Lane End, St Elphin's School for Daughters of the Clergy, and the Central Educational Bureau for Women. She left University College, London after one year.