In January 2018, the Edinburgh International Book Festival put on a celebration of Muriel Spark. Taking place in the Usher Hall on the eve of the centenary of the novelist’s birth, it included a rehearsed reading of Doctors Of Philosophy, Spark’s only play. Among the actors was Gabriel Quigley who turned out to have a formidable knowledge of the Edinburgh author. “You really know your Spark,” said director David Greig, impressed.
You do not have to talk to Quigley for long to see why. She raves about The Prime Of Miss Jean Brodie, of course, but her conversation encompasses everything from Spark’s short stories to her autobiography and her 1990 novel Symposium. As a student, she studied Spark as part of her course at the University of Glasgow and as an actor, appeared in Laurie Sansom’s adaptation of The Driver’s Seat for the National Theatre of Scotland. Her passion is infectious.
“I feel like I know her well,” says Quigley. “She is a stylist and a true modernist, but she is a realist about life – and the surreality and unexpectedness of life. That’s where the great truth in her writing comes from.” [READ MORE]