Marjorie Boulton

Marjorie Boulton (7 May 1924 – 30 August 2017) was a British author and poet writing in both English and Esperanto.

Biography

Marjorie Boulton studied English at Somerville College, Oxford where she was taught by C. S. Lewis and J. R. R. Tolkien. She was a candidate for the Nobel Prize in Literature in 2008.

She taught English literature in teacher training and (from 1962 to 1970) as a college principal for 24 years before turning to full-time research and writing. She is a well-known writer in Esperanto. Boulton in her later years was president of two Esperanto organisations, Kat-amikaro and ODES.

She was the author of Zamenhof: Creator of Esperanto — a biography of L. L. Zamenhof published in 1960 by Routledge & Kegan Paul of London. She also wrote a widely used series of introductory texts on literary studies: The Anatomy of Poetry (1953), The Anatomy of Prose (1954), The Anatomy of Drama (1960), The Anatomy of Language (1968), The Anatomy of the Novel (1975) and The Anatomy of Literary Studies (1980). Her first book was Preliminaries: Poems (1949). Later books of poetry, as well as short story collections, were in Esperanto, which she learnt in 1949.

Selected publications

Works in Esperanto Poetry collections Kontralte (1955) Kvarpieda kamarado (1956) Cent ĝojkantoj (1957) Eroj kaj aliaj poemoj (1959)

Drama Virino ĉe la landlimo (1959) Nia sango (1970) Ni aktoras (1971)

Short stories Dek du piedetoj (1964) Okuloj (1967)

Essays Rimleteroj (1976; with William Auld) Poeto fajrakora: la verkaro de Julio Baghy (1983) Faktoj kaj fantazioj (1984; 2nd Ed, 1993) Esperanta literaturo – fenomeno unika (1984) Ne nur leteroj al plum-amikoj (1984) Du el (1985; with Paul Thorsen)

Works in English Poetry collections Preliminaries (1949)

Biography Zamenhof: Creator of Esperanto (1960; published in 1962 in Esperanto as Zamenhof, aŭtoro de Esperanto)

Literary criticisms The Anatomy of Poetry (1953) The Anatomy of Prose (1954) Saying What We Mean (1959) The Anatomy of Drama (1960) Words in Real Life (1965) The Anatomy of Language (1968) Reading in Real Life (1971) The Anatomy of the Novel (1975) The Anatomy of Literary Studies (1980)