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Diana Athill (21 December 1917 – 23 January 2019) was a British literary editor, novelist and memoirist who worked with some of the greatest writers of the 20th century at the London-based publishing company André Deutsch Ltd.Athill, Diana (5 January 2008), "'Getting things right': Recalling her life as one of the 20th century's most acclaimed editors, Diana Athill, who has just turned 90, was a pioneer of the confessional memoir. Her new book is about ageing". The Guardian.
Athill graduated from Lady Margaret Hall, Oxford, in 1939 Prominent alumni, Lady Margaret Hall, Oxford, UK. and worked for the BBC throughout the Second World War.
Athill retired from Deutsch in 1993 at the age of 75, after more than 50 years in publishing. She continued to influence the literary world through her revealing memoirs about her editorial career.
The first book of her own writing to appear was the short story collection An Unavoidable Delay (1962), and she published two further works of fiction: a novel entitled Don't Look at Me Like That (1967) and in 2011 another volume of stories, Midsummer Night in the Workhouse. She was best known, however, for her books of memoirs, the first of which was Instead of a Letter in 1963. These memoirs were not written in chronological order, Yesterday Morning (2002) being the account of her childhood. She also translated various works from French.
She appeared on Desert Island Discs in 2004 at the age of 86 and selected a recording of Haydn's The Creation as the most valued of the eight records and Thackeray's Vanity Fair as the book.
In June 2010, she was the subject of a BBC documentary, Growing Old Disgracefully, part of the Imagine series. In 2013, she was listed as one of the 50 best-dressed over-50s by The Guardian.
In 2011, Granta Books published Instead of a Book: Letters to a Friend, a collection of letters from Athill to the American poet Edward Field chronicling their intimate correspondence spanning more than 30 years (he kept all her letters, she kept none of his). "Diana Athill introduces Instead of a Book: Letters to a Friend", Granta Books via YouTube, 3 November 2011. Retrieved 31 August 2025.Eichenberger, Bill (7 June 2012), "Diana Athill's 'Letters to a Friend' is one side of an interesting friendship", Cleveland.com. Granta Books published two further titles by her: Alive, Alive Oh!: And Other Things That Matter in 2015 and A Florence Diary in 2016.
Athill was appointed an Officer of the Order of the British Empire (OBE) in the 2009 New Year Honours for services to literature.
She called herself a "sucker for oppressed foreigners", an inclination she characterized as a "funny kink" in her maternal instinct: "I never particularly wanted children, but it came out in liking lame ducks." One lover, the Egyptian author Waguih Ghali, a depressive, committed suicide in her flat. Her most remarkable affair, about which she later wrote a book, was "a fleeting, and distinctly odd" relationship with Hakim Jamal, an American Black radical who asserted he was God and who was a cousin of Malcolm X. Jamal's other lover, Gale Benson, was murdered by Trinidadian Black Power leader Michael X. Jamal was killed by others a year later. Athill's account of these events was published in 1993 as Make Believe: A True Story.
Her longest relationship was with the Jamaican playwright Barry Reckord. The affair lasted eight years, but he shared her flat for forty. She described it as a "detached" sort of marriage.
She moved into a flat in a north London residence for the "active elderly" at the end of 2009,Wagner, Erica "Diana Athill", The Gentlewoman, Issue 14, Autumn & Winter 2016. saying about this decision: "Almost at once on arrival at the home I knew that it was going to suit me. And sure enough, it does. A life free of worries in a snug little nest...." Even during her old age, she reemphasized that she had no regrets about not having her own children, saying: "I dearly love certain young people of my acquaintance and am happy to have them in my life, but am I sorry that they are not my descendants? No, I much prefer thinking of them as surprising and very gratifying friends."
Athill died at a hospice in London on 23 January 2019, aged 101, following a short illness.
Her nephew and heir, the art historian Philip Athill, is managing director of the dealership and gallery, Abbott and Holder.
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