Straddling the British Colonial World: Primrose Marie Swan

Primrose Marie Swan wrote many books while she was living in Kenya, including ‘Dim Venue’; ‘Tides Of Zhimoni’;  ‘So Low The Stars’; ‘Wake Of A Moonbeam’; ‘No Day But This’; Secret Splendour’; ‘Joyous Bondage’; ‘Dear Enchantment’ and ‘Dangerous Delight’. All written under the nom de plume Valerie Rift (after the Rift Valley of Africa) and published by Wright & Brown Ltd, London.  She worked as a journalist for the Nairobi Times and later as editor of the women’s section of the newspaper.
She also wrote an autobiographical account of her life in Kenya under her own name Marie  Bartlett titled ‘The Rhino Stayed For Breakfast’. It is of life set in colonial Kenya, the difficulties faced by Europeans in an increasingly hostile environment of Mau Mau revolution. Fearing for the safety of her two children, born in Kenya, Marie and her husband Bill returned to Britain where she continued her writing.

As a young woman in Colombo she was involved in amateur dramatics which continued after she left Ceylon and acted a few ‘bit’ parts in films in America. She also wrote two plays for television ‘Half A Loaf’ and ‘The Two Widows’.

Her biggest literary challenge was a multi-volume epic on the life and times of Eleanor of Aquitaine, mother of Richard the Lion Heart and John. She notes: “Years ago when my husband and I were motoring from Pyatigorsk in the north Caucasus to Trabzond (Trebizond) on the Black Sea, we saw members of the once nomadic Khevsuri tribe re-enact incidents from the Second Crusade. Wearing 12th-Century armour, they fought battles and chanted songs. One song was about Eleanor of Aquitaine, who in golden boots and Amazon garb led a corps of warriors to the Holy Land. As we traced our way over the route once taken by this crusade, we picked up so much lore about these armed Pilgrims that it seemed a pity not to put it in a book.

“However, when I began to research into the life of Eleanor, I came upon a confusion of contradictions and anomalies. It is not certain, for instance, if it was from her grandfather or her father that she inherited her duchy. Eventually I went down among the grass roots of Eleanor’s beloved Aquitaine, visited her castles in Bordeaux and Poitou, talked to historians, archivists and librarians. The picture which emerged I have endeavoured to set down in this story.

“My grateful thanks to all those who helped me. In my small way I shall try to repay their kindness. My thanks too to L G Lovell, Chief Librarian and his staff of the Rotherham Public Library, and to John Chapman, Chief Librarian, Maltby, Yorkshire.

“There are no fictitious characters in this book. Quotations from chronicles, historians, etc., as well as Eleanor’s own sayings are included in text and dialogue.”

This literary effort won her an award for the best historical semi-fiction and she soon was widely acknowledged as an authority on the life of Eleanor of Aquitaine.

Marie Swan’s post-African books were ‘The Diadems of a Dutchess – A Reconstruction of the Life and Times of Eleanor of Aquitaine’; ‘Corina’s Diadem’; A Diadem For Philippa’; ‘A Stillness In The Sun’; ‘The Catalyst’ and ‘The Sunfarers’. All written under the nom de plume Rowena Lee and published by Robert Hale & Company, London.

Marie Swan hammered her stories using an ancient typewriter. Many years later, in her late 70s and when arthritis made it difficult to ‘pound the keys’, her children bought her an electronic machine. She did not take lightly to the “new-fangled” soft-touch type and her letters reflected this in numerous (uncharacteristic) spelling mistakes with extra letters appearing in words.

She would type a manuscript in draft from hand-written notes and send it to her typist in Wales before submitting it to her publishers. Those were the days before PCs, of course. On one occasion, she got a “hysterical call” from her typist saying her house was burnt down and the manuscript was destroyed. While this would put off any mere mortal from ever writing again, Marie Swan re-constructed the entire novel from her notes and papers that had been carefully – and thankfully – stored.
Her books live on, translated into several languages and special large-print editions.
———-

Sandy,  …. My father was Lt Col Gordon Llewellyn Spencer Austin CASC ED
Mother was Primrose Marie Swan. 

  ALL the AUSTIN’S at a recent Christmas