Simon, Edith (writer and artist) (1917-2003)
Dates
- Existence: 1917-2003 - 2003
Biography
Edith Simon was born on 18 May 1917 in Berlin, Germany, to Walter and Grete Simon. Educated at the Fürstin-Bismarck Gymnasium, she showed a talent for art and history, and enjoyed early success with the publication of her drawings whilst still only 10 years old. Her father Walter, a decorated Great War veteran and successful businessman, moved with his young family to London when Edith was just 15, as the political climate in Germany became increasingly threatening. Edith, alongside her younger sister Inge, arrived in the British capital in 1932.
Edith studied for a short time at both the Slade School of Fine Art and the Central School of Art and Design. She also became an early member of the Artists International Association (AIA), which formed in London in 1933.
Writing Career
Embarking on her professional writing career, Edith’s first book was a children’s adventure story which she wrote and illustrated, titled Somersaults and Strange Company, published by Lawrence & Wishart in 1937. She had also begun working at this time as a book jacket illustrator, demonstrating her signature style and draughtsmanship. In 1938, she translated Arthur Koestler’s The Gladiators into English, which was published a year later. Her first novel, The Chosen, was published in 1940 by John Lane, The Bodley Head, when Edith was still only 23.
She would go on to author 17 books, including contemporary novels, historical novels, and histories, as well as contributing to edited collections. Her published work includes:
Somersaults and Strange Company (Lawrence & Wishart 1937)
The Gladiators by Arthur Koestler, (UK Johnathan Cape 1939; US Macmillan - New York 1939) (translated by Edith Simon)
The Chosen (The Bodley Head 1940)
Biting the Blue Finger (The Bodley Head 1942)
Wings Deceive (The Bodley Head 1944)
The Other Passion (The Bodley Head 1948)
The Golden Hand (UK edition Cassell & Co. Ltd. 1952; US edition G.P. Putnam's Sons 1951)
The Past Masters (UK edition Cassell & Co. Ltd. 1953; US edition 'The House of Strangers', G.P. Putnam's Sons 1953)
The Twelve Pictures (UK edition Cassell & Co. Ltd. 1956; US edition G.P. Putnam's Sons 1955)
The Sable Coat (Cassell & Co. Ltd. 1958)
The Piebald Standard: A Biography of the Knights Templar (UK edition Cassell & Co. Ltd. 1959; US edition G.P. Putnam's Sons 1959)
The Undying Past, ed. Orville Prescott (Doubleday 1961) (contributor)
The Great Forgery (UK edition Cassell & Co. Ltd. 1962; US edition Little, Brown & Co. 1962)
The Making of Frederick the Great (UK edition Cassell & Co. Ltd. 1963; US editions Little, Brown & Co., reprint Greenan Press)
Friedrich Der Grosse, Das Weiden eines Königs (Rainer Wunderlich Verlag, Hermann Leins, Tubingen, 1963)
The Book of Books – A Treasury of Great Bible Fiction, eds. Irwin R Blacker & Ethel H Blacker (Holt, Reinhart & Winston NY, 1965) (contributor)
The Reformation (Time-Life 1966)
Die Reformation von Edith Simon und der Redaktion der Time-Life (Time-Life 1967)
The Saints (UK edition Weidenfeld & Nicolson 1968; US edition Delacorte Press 1968)
Luther Alive (UK edition Hodder & Stoughton 1968; US edition Doubleday 1968)
The Anglo-Saxon Manner (Cassell & Co. Ltd. 1972)
The Makers of Modern Thought (Horizon Books American Heritage Books – subsidiary of McGraw Hill 1972) (contributor)
‘Frederick II the Great of Prussia’ (Encyclopaedia Britannica 1974) (contributor)
In addition, Edith also wrote two plays ‘The Inimitable’ and ‘Love Me, Scum’, neither of which were ever performed, and she completed a film script entitled 'A Perfect Marriage'.
It was in London in 1942 that Edith met the noted scientist Dr. Eric Reeve, whom she married that same year. The couple moved to Edinburgh in 1947 to facilitate Eric’s new role with Edinburgh University’s Genetics Department. They lived first at Mortonhall House, alongside a team of geneticists also working at the University. They would subsequently move to Roseberry Crescent, and Lansdowne Crescent, before settling permanently in Grosvenor Crescent. They had three children, Antonia (b.1950), Simon (b.1952), and Jessica (b. 1954).
Art Career
Edith returned to her artistic practice in the early 1970s, participating in an early exhibition at the Demarco Gallery in Edinburgh in 1970, followed by her first one-woman show at Gallerie Balans in Amsterdam in 1971 where she presented mobile sculptures and her signature papercut bas relief paintings. Edith would go on to stage and appear in over 50 exhibitions throughout her career. She experimented with and explored many mediums and forms including continuous line drawings, papercut bas relief scalpel paintings, rope sculptures, mobile and soft sculptures, sculptures in stained wood, ciment-fondue, vacuum formed perspex, cast polyester resin, cold-cast bronze, copper, aluminium, metal sheet, and carved plaster. She also utilised painted glass, as well as undertaking murals in paint and wood veneer. For over thirty years, she exhibited annually at the Edinburgh Festival, with her final show being held in 2001. [A full list of exhibitions (1970-2003) is available on the Edith Simon Gallery website cited below.]
In 1995, Edith contracted a respiratory infection which revealed an existing condition, widely known as emphysema. This necessitated the use of daily oxygen for the remainder of her life. Edith Simon died in Edinburgh on 7 January 2003.
Biographical information has been taken from ‘Moderation be Damned: Edith Simon’, published by Antonia Reeve in 2005, alongside the artist’s biographical note on the Edith Simon Gallery website, available at edith-simon.com.
Found in 446 Collections and/or Records:
Letters from Edith Simon to Inge Goodwin, 7 February - 30 December 1960
Letters accompanied by a manuscript note, possibly by Inge Goodwin, stating that contents include references to 'writing The Making of Frederick the Great.'
Letters from Edith Simon to Inge Goodwin, 24 January - 31 October 1961
Letters accompanied by a manuscript note, possibly by Inge Goodwin, stating that Edith and family moved to Lansdowne Crescent in 1961, from Rosebery Crescent.
Letters from Edith Simon to Inge Goodwin, 6 January - 22 December 1963
Letters accompanied by a manuscript note, possibly by Inge Goodwin, stating that the contents include references to 'The Frederick Play' [possibly Love Me, Scum!]
Letters from Edith Simon to Inge Goodwin, 3 January - 30 December 1964
Letters accompanied by a manuscript note, possibly by Inge Goodwin, stating that the contents include references to 'planning/writing the Ballet/Autism novel'; 'dropping Manners and Morals' [later The Saints]; 'Walter's illness'; 'The Golden Wedding'; financial matters; and possibly advice on Inge's translation work on 'Emil Nolde : the forbidden pictures'.
Letters from Edith Simon to Inge Goodwin, 10 January - 29 December 1965
Letters from Edith Simon to Inge Goodwin, 7 January - 23 November 1966
File also contains a letter from R.D. Smith, BBC, to Inge Goodwin concerning Edith Simon's two plays, The Inimitable, and Love Me, Scum! (22 August 1966)
Letters from Edith Simon to Inge Goodwin, 5 January - 23 November 1967
Letters from Edith Simon to Inge Goodwin, 4 January - 17 November 1968
Letters from Edith Simon to Inge Goodwin, 5/8 January - 3 December 1969
Letters from Edith Simon to Inge Goodwin, 11 May - 30 December 1970
Letters from Edith Simon to Inge Goodwin, 21 March - 13 December 1971
Headed paper used by Edith Simon shows a change in address to Grosvenor Crescent, Edinburgh, at this time.
Letters from Edith Simon to Inge Goodwin, 2 January - 10 September 1972
Letters from Edith Simon to Inge Goodwin, ?8 January - 30 December 1973
Letters from Edith Simon to Inge Goodwin, 6 May - 15 November 1974
File also includes an exhibition programme for 'Edith Simon's Open House', 9-27 July 1974.
Letters from Edith Simon to Inge Goodwin, 2 January - 10 December 1975
Letters from Edith Simon to Joan Feisenberger, 1945-1959
File contains illustrated letters and cards, and includes letters from the Reeve children, Antonia, Simon, and Jessica. File also contains three photographs of unidentified children [possibly Antonia and Simon Reeve]. [Joan was the widow of writer and critic John Mair (d.1942), and later married Dr H.A. Feisenberger]
Letters from Edith Simon to Joan Feisenberger, 1979-1989
File also contains one letter from Antonia Reeve to Joan (1 December 1979); and an incomplete, undated, printed list of Edith Simon artworks, possibly paintings. [Joan was the widow of writer and critic John Mair (d.1942), and later married Dr H.A. Feisenberger]
Letters from the Reeve Family to Grete Simon, 1967-1979
Grete Simon is also known as 'Mutti' in family letters. Correspondents include Edith Simon and Eric Reeve and their children Antonia, Jessica, and Simon. File also contains illustrated letters; a newspaper clipping of an unspecified subject matter; a text reinterpretation of the Ten Commandments by Arthur Hugh Clough; and an exhibition flyer for 'Edith Simon Works: Pictures, Sculptures', undated.
Letters, notes, and typescript drafts concerning an unpublished novel, 1965-1966
May possibly refer to an abandoned novel, provisionally entitled elsewhere in the collection as 'An Affair of Love'.
Letters of, and relating to, the Reeve Family, 1972-1976
File contains a letter from Antonia Reeve to her aunt Inge Goodwin; a letter from Jessica Reeve to her father Eric Reeve; a letter from Eric Reeve to Edith Simon; and a letter from Edith Simon to Dr. Downs of the British Steel Corporation concerning a sculpture project.
Letters of, and to, Edith Simon and Eric Reeve, 1943, 1952, 1972, 1991, 2000-2005
Letters of Edith Simon and Jessica Reeve to Inge Goodwin and Grete Simon, 29 December 1980 - 26 August 1981
Letters of Edith Simon to her parents, Walter and Grete Simon, 1947-1949
File contains letters and illustrated greeting cards, and one card also from Inge Goodwin (née Simon) to her parents Walter and Grete.
Letters of Edith Simon to 'Mutti' [Grete Simon], with accompanying papers, ?1952, 1972-1975, undated
File contains five letters to 'Mutti' (?1952, 1972-1975). Also included is one undated letter from Theodore Purdy to Edith Simon concerning an unspecified manuscript; a handwritten transcription and English translation (possibly by Inge Goodwin) of a German language poem Walter Simon once wrote for his wife Grete; a typescript entitled 'The Ballad of Mortonhall'; and an illustrated typescript ?riddle/poem by an author identified as Whistlers Boss.