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| | Guardian Unlimited Books | Authors | Spark, Muriel |
 | | James Gillespie's School for Girls, Edinburgh (upon which the Marcia Blaine School in The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie was modelled, and where Spark came under the spell of a charismatic teacher); Heriot-Watt College, Edinburgh, where she did a course in precis-writing. |
 | | Spark began her literary career in the 1950s as a poet and biographer (of Wordsworth, Mary Shelley, Emily Brontë and John Masefield), but found her voice as a novelist and short-story writer. |
 | | Dame Muriel Spark, mistress of ambivalent irony, thrilled her fans with a rare public appearance at the book festival in Edinburgh, the city she still calls home, despite having lived in Italy for years. |
| www.guardian.co.uk /Books/authors/author/0,5917,1155152,00.html (596 words) |
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