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Philip Hensher

Philip Hensher was born in London in 1965. He was educated at Oxford and Cambridge, where he wrote a PhD on eighteenth-century English painting and satire. From 1990 to 1996 he was a House of Commons clerk. His books include Other Lulus (1994), Kitchen Venom (1996), which won the Somerset Maugham award, Pleasured (1998), The Bedroom of the Mister’s Wife (1999), The Mulberry Empire (2002), The Fit (2005), The Northern Clemency (2008), which was shortlisted for the 2008 Man Booker Prize, King of the Badgers (2011) and Scenes From Early Life (2012), which won the 2013 Royal Society of Literature Ondaatje Prize, The Friendly Ones (2018), A Small Revolution in Germany (2020) and To Battersea Park (2023). His collection of stories, Tales of Persuasion, was published in 2016. Hensher has edited The Penguin Book of the British Short Story Volume I II and The Penguin Book of the Contemporary British Short Story.

He also wrote a libretto to Thomas Ades’ opera, Powder Her Face (1995), which has been performed across the world, recorded by EMI and filmed by Channel Four. He is a regular contributor to The Spectator, The Independent, and other English newspapers. Hensher was made a fellow of the Royal Society of Literature in 1998, and is on the Council of the Society.

He is Professor of Creative Writing at Bath Spa University and lives in London.

Twitter: @PhilipHensher

Books in order of publication:

Other Lulus (1994)

Kitchen Venom (1996)

Pleasured (1998)

The Bedroom of the Mister’s Wife (1999)

The Mulberry Empire (2002)

The Fit (2004)

The Northern Clemency (2008)

King of Badgers (2011).

Scenes from Early Life (2012).

The Missing Ink: How Handwriting Makes Us Who We Are (2012)

The Emperor Waltz (2014)

The Penguin Book of the British Short Story, vol I and II (2015)

Tales of Persuasion (stories) (2016)

The Penguin Book of the Contemporary British Short Story (2018)

The Friendly Ones (2018)

A Small Revolution in Germany (2020)

To Battersea Park (2023)

Philip Hensher Titles