MORTIMER, PENELOPE

born Sept. 19, 1918, Rhyl, Flintshire, Wales died Oct. 19, 1999, London, Eng. in full Penelope Ruth Mortimer, ne Penelope Fletcher British journalist and novelist noted for her compact style of writing depicting a nightmarish world of neuroses and broken marriages. After her graduation from the University of London, she began to write poetry, book reviews, and short stories. She was married to the journalist Charles Dimont; in 1949 they divorced and she married the playwright and author John Mortimer (divorced 1972), with whom she later collaborated on the book Daddy's Gone A-Hunting (1958). She is perhaps best known for her novel The Pumpkin Eater (1962), a disturbingly vivid story of a woman whose compulsive anxiety to bear children gradually isolates her from her successive husbands. Adapted by Harold Pinter, it became a successful film in 1964. Her other works include a collection of short stories, Saturday Lunch with the Brownings (1960), and the novels My Friend Says It's Bullet-Proof (1967), Long Distance (1974), and The Handyman (1983). Mortimer was commissioned to write a biography of the Queen Mother, but, when published, Queen Elizabeth: A Life of the Queen Mother (1986) created a furor because of its forthright treatment of a woman who was revered by the British public. A softened version of the biography was published as Queen Mother: An Alternative Portrait of Her Life and Times in 1995. Mortimer also published two volumes of autobiography: About Time (1979) and About Time Too (1993); the former won the Whitbread Prize for biography in 1979.