Peter O'Donnell
Peter O'Donnell was a prominent English writer, born on April 11, 1920, in Lewisham, London. He began his writing career at a young age, selling his first story to a boys' magazine when he was just sixteen. After serving in the Royal Signal Corps during World War II, O'Donnell became an editor and worked on various children's comics, including the popular comic strip Garth. His most notable creation is the character Modesty Blaise, a strong and complex superheroine who first appeared in a comic strip in 1963. Inspired by a young girl he encountered in Iran, Modesty Blaise quickly gained international acclaim, leading to a series of novels that further explored her adventures. In addition to his work with Modesty Blaise, O'Donnell also wrote historical romances under the pseudonym Madeleine Brent, featuring strong-minded heroines facing challenges in foreign environments. O'Donnell's versatility as a writer is evident across multiple genres, and he is celebrated for his intricate storytelling and well-developed characters. His legacy continues to influence the portrayal of female protagonists in action and adventure narratives.
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Peter O'Donnell
Writer
- Born: April 11, 1920
- Birthplace: Lewisham, near London, England
- Died: May 10, 2010
Biography
Peter O’Donnell was born in Lewisham, near London, England, on April 11, 1920. He was the son of Bernard O’Donnell, a crime reporter, and Katie Louise Wadey O’Donnell. O’Donnell was educated at Catford Central School, London. On November 26, 1940, he married Constance Doris Green, a company director. They had two daughters, Jill Penelope and Janet Mary. The family later went to live in the Brighton area.
At sixteen, O’Donnell wrote his first story and sold it to a boys’ magazine. After high school, he was hired by Amalgamated Press to write children’s comics. During World War II, O’Donnell served in the Royal Signal Corps. In 1946, he became an editor for Clerke and Cochran, where he worked on several series for boys. For fifteen years, he wrote the comic strip Garth, and for lesser periods he also wrote Tug Transom and Romeo Brown.
In 1962, the strip cartoon editor of the Daily Express group asked O’Donnell to devise a comic strip for adults. Inspired by a young girl he had seen in Iran, O’Donnell created Modesty Blaise, who was orphaned as a child and mentored by a fellow refugee, a Jewish professor. Modesty founded a crime syndicate, became wealthy, and retired. The comic strip begins when she comes out of retirement to work for a British spymaster.
When it appeared in 1963, Modesty Blaise was a success and before long was syndicated throughout the world. In 1965, O’Donnell published the first of a series of Modesty Blaise novels, which also gained international popularity. Later he also wrote short stories and graphic novels featuring his superheroine.
The Modesty Blaise novels are action-packed thrillers, complete with exotic settings, formidable villains, frequent violence, and ingenious escapes. Modesty herself is shown as much more than merely a fantastic superheroine, and the other characters who appear in the series are just as believable—the spymaster Sir Gerald Tarrant, for example, and Modesty’s loyal lieutenant Willie Garvin. Even the villains have human frailties.
In 1971, writing as Madeleine Brent, O’Donnell published his first historical romance. In it and in all of the romances that followed, a virtuous, strong-minded heroine has to survive in an foreign world. In Stormswift, for example, the heroine is sold into slavery, while in The Capricorn Stone, she is thrown into the criminal underworld of Victorian England. Though she may deceived at first, at the end of the novel his heroine always falls into the arms of the man she now knows to be a true hero. Brent received a major award from the Romantic Novelists’ Association in 1978 but the publisher accepted the award in “her” place. Not until later was Brent was identified as O’Donnell.
Peter O’Donnell is recognized as a superb writer in three genres: the comic strip, the adventure thriller, and the historical romance. However, his reputation rests primarily on his creation of Modesty Blaise, a superheroine in a genre that usually features superheroes and a character with an enthusiastic following throughout the world.