American writer
Claire Huchet Bishop |
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| Born | 30 December 1898
Switzerland |
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| Died | 13 March 1993 (aged 94)
Paris, France |
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| Nationality | Swiss |
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| Education | Sorbonne, University of Paris |
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| Known for | Writing, writer, children's literature, poet, lecturer, editor |
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| Notable work | The Five Chinese Brothers, Pancakes-Paris, All Alone, and Twenty and Ten |
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Claire Huchet Bishop (30 December 1898 – 13 March 1993)[1] was a Swiss children's writer and librarian. She wrote two Newbery Medal runners-up, Pancakes-Paris (1947) and All Alone (1953), and she won the Josette Frank Award for Twenty and Ten (1952). Her first English-language children's book became a classic: The Five Chinese Brothers, illustrated by Kurt Wiese and published in 1938, was named to the Lewis Carroll Shelf Award list in 1959.
Life
Claire Huchet was born in Geneva, Switzerland[2] and grew up in France[3] or Geneva.[4] She attended the Sorbonne and started the first children's library in France.[4] After marrying the American concert pianist Frank Bishop,[2] she moved to the United States, worked for the New York City Public Library from 1932–36,[5] and was an apologist for Roman Catholicism and an opponent[2] of antisemitism.[3]
She was a lecturer and storyteller throughout the US and was a children's book editor for Commonweal for some time.[5]
Bishop was the President of International Council of Christians and Jews from 1975–77 and the Jewish-Christian Fellowship of France from 1976-81.[5]
Two of her books were made into films.[6]
After residing in New York for 50 years, Bishop returned to France and died in Paris in 1993.[2] She was 94 years old and died of a hemorrhage of the aorta.[6]
