Brigid Brophy

Brigid Antonia Brophy (married name Brigid Levey, later Lady Levey; 12 June 1929 – 7 August 1995) was an English author, literary critic and polemicist. She was an influential campaigner who agitated for many types of social reform, including homosexual parity, vegetarianism, humanism, and animal rights. Brophy appeared frequently on television and in the newspapers of the 1960s and 1970s, making her prominent both in literary circles and on the wider cultural scene. Brophy's major achievements include igniting contemporary debate about animal rights, and the establishment of the Public Lending Right by which writers in the UK receive a payment each time their book is borrowed from a public library. Born in London to the writer John Brophy and his teacher wife, Charis, Brigid Brophy's education was fragmented by her wartime attendance at many different schools, including St Paul's Girls' School, in London's Brook Green, and The Abbey School, Reading. A precocious child, her literary talents were kindled by her father, who encouraged her to read the authors he admired, including George Bernard Shaw, John Milton and Evelyn Waugh. Aged 15, Brophy gained a scholarship to Oxford University. She studied classics at St Hugh's College; however, she did not gain a degree: the authorities asked her not to return after her fourth term. (This caused Brophy such severe upset that afterwards she only sketched the reasons for it, citing frowned-upon sexual activity and drunkenness.) After a period of psychological turmoil, Brophy worked as a shorthand-typist and shared a rented flat near London Zoo with a friend from Oxford.