P. L. Travers
P. L. Travers was an Australian-born author best known for her beloved children's series featuring the character Mary Poppins. Born in Queensland to parents of Irish and Scottish descent, her upbringing was influenced by her father's storytelling and her mother's imaginative spirit. Travers began writing at a young age and pursued a career in acting before becoming a writer. Her literary journey took her to Ireland, where she was mentored by notable poets such as George Russell and William Butler Yeats.
In 1934, she published the first Mary Poppins book, which spawned several sequels and established her as a significant figure in children's literature. The character of Mary Poppins is known for her complex and enigmatic personality, and the series has been translated into numerous languages, selling millions of copies. The 1964 Disney adaptation of Mary Poppins, while a commercial success, left Travers with mixed feelings, particularly regarding creative liberties taken with her work.
Throughout her life, Travers remained private, focusing on her writing and contributions to literature, culminating in her recognition as an Officer of the Order of the British Empire in 1977. Even after her passing in 1996, her legacy continues to inspire interest, particularly through portrayals of her life and work in films like "Saving Mr. Banks." Travers's enduring impact on literature and culture is evident through her diverse body of work and the ongoing appeal of Mary Poppins.
P. L. Travers
Australian-born British children's novelist, poet, and actor.
- Born: August 9, 1899
- Birthplace: Queensland, Australia
- Died: April 23, 1996
- Place of death: Chelsea, London, England
Biography
Author P. L. Travers was born in Queensland, Australia, to parents of Irish and Scottish descent. Her Irish father, Robert Travers, was the owner of a sugarcane plantation in Australia, but his heart remained in Ireland. Although he died when Travers was quite young, his love of Ireland and his treasure trove of Irish tales, myths, and legends left their mark on his daughter. Her mother, Margaret (Goff) Travers, was of Scottish-Irish descent. Travers remembers her mother’s playful and imaginative spirit and also recalls dipping into her mother’s collection of novels. Both of Travers’s parents were "allusive talkers," in Travers’s words, who spun tales and loved conversation. Their library was small, but contained books—the Bible; works of William Shakespeare; Charles Dickens; Alfred, Lord Tennyson; and the Irish poets—that had a great impact on Travers’s work.
After her father’s death, Travers, her mother, and two younger sisters moved to the sugarcane plantation of her great- aunt Christina. Travers was seven years old and remembers beginning to write stories and poems at that time. As a teenager, she turned down a scholarship to the University of Sydney in order to help her family financially. Travers was also interested in acting, and she joined a touring Shakespeare company in Australia while still in her teens. She was able to earn money as both an actress and as a poet, which she contributed to her family’s shaky finances. At this time she also adopted the name P. L. Travers, shortened from Pamela Lyndon Travers.
At the age of eighteen, once Travers had achieved a certain measure of confidence and independence in Australia, she decided to go to Ireland. In Dublin, an early influence was the Irish poet George Russell (known as Æ), who accepted her poetry for the Irish Statesman Along with famed Irish poet William Butler Yeats, Russell served as her mentor. Early in her career Travers also worked as a drama critic and travel writer.
After achieving some success as a writer in Ireland, Travers moved to England and began work on the creation that would make her famous, Mary Poppins. The first book, simply titled Mary Poppins, was published in 1934 and launched a series of sequels: Mary Poppins Comes Back, Mary Poppins Opens the Door, Mary Poppins in the Park, Mary Poppins From A to Z, Mary Poppins in the Kitchen, Mary Poppins in Cherry Tree Lane, and Mary Poppins and the House Next Door. Travers’s character is quite complex and rather enigmatic, often rooting her magic in everyday sources and certainly never becoming sentimental or cloying. The Mary Poppins books have been translated into twenty-five languages and have sold millions of copies.
Mary Poppins gained even greater fame with the release of the 1964 Academy Award-winning Disney film Mary Poppins, starring Julie Andrews and Dick Van Dyke. Although the original book was set in the 1930s, Travers suggested that the film be restaged to an Edwardian time period, a suggestion realized in the film. Travers expressed admiration for Andrews’s performance, but was somewhat dissatisfied with the film as a whole. In 2004, Mary Poppins reappeared as a London stage play.
Travers wrote regularly for both children and adults and was inspired by her travels. In the same year Mary Poppins was published, Travers traveled to Russia to write Moscow Excursion. From 1941 to 1943, she lived on a Navajo reservation in the United States, and from 1970 to 1976, she lived in New York City. After she returned to London in 1976, she served as consulting editor and published regularly in the scholarly journal Parabola as an expert on myth and folklore. She was made an Officer of the Order of the British Empire in 1977 for her contributions to English literature. Throughout the years, Travers remained reclusive, cultivating a certain anonymity. Her belief was that her work, not herself, should take center stage. She died in 1996 in Chelsea, London, England, survived by one adopted son and three grandchildren.
There was something of a renewal of interest in Travers, particularly the details of her personal life and the creation for the film version of Mary Poppins, with the release of the film Saving Mr. Banks in 2013. It presented a semi-fictionalized account of the childhood of Travers as well as the negotiation and planning of the Disney film. It starred Emma Thompson as an adult Travers and Tom Hanks as Walt Disney.
Author Works
Children's Literature:
Mary Poppins, 1934
Mary Poppins Comes Back, 1935
I Go by Sea, I Go by Land, 1941
Aunt Sass, 1941
Ah Wong, 1943
Mary Poppins Opens the Door, 1943
John Delaney, 1944
Mr. Wigg's Birthday Party, 1952 (excerpt from Mary Poppins)
The Gingerbread Shop, 1952 (excerpt from Mary Poppins)
Mary Poppins in the Park, 1952
The Magic Compass, 1953 (excerpt from Mary Poppins)
Mary Poppins from A to Z, 1962
The Fox at the Manger, 1962
Friend Monkey, 1971
About the Sleeping Beauty, 1973
Mary Poppins in the Kitchen, 1975
Two Pairs of Shoes, 1976
Mary Poppins in Cherry Tree Lane, 1982
Mary Poppins and the House Next Door, 1988
Children's Short Fiction:
Stories from Mary Poppins, 1952
Mary Poppins Omnibooks, 1999
Nonfiction:
Moscow Excursion, 1934
George Ivanovitch Gurdjieff, 1973
About the Sleeping Beauty, 1975
What the Bee Knows: Reflections on Myth, Symbol, and Story, 1989
Bibliography
Barlass, Tim. "The Truth Behind Mary Poppins Creator P. L. Travers." The Sydney Morning Herald, 5 Jan. 2014, www.smh.com.au/entertainment/movies/the-truth-behind-mary-poppins-creator-pl-travers-20140104-30akz.html. Accessed 16 June 2017. Examines the life and career of Travers in light of her private nature and the release of the film Saving Mr. Banks.
Henderson, Amy. How Did P.L. Travers, the Prickly Author of Mary Poppins, Really Fare Against Walt Disney? Smithsonian.com, 20 Dec. 2013, www.smithsonianmag.com/smithsonian-institution/how-did-pl-travers-the-prickly-author-of-mary-poppins-really-fare-against-walt-disney-180949052/. Accessed 16 June 2017. Discusses the factual biographic details of Travers behind the fictionalized film Saving Mr. Banks.
Hughes, Kathryn. "What Saving Mr. Banks Tells Us about the Original Mary Poppins." The Guardian, 7 Dec. 2013, www.theguardian.com/books/2013/dec/07/pl-travers-saving-mr-banks-original-mary-poppins. Accessed 16 June 2017. Hughes uses her personal experiences with the Mary Poppins books from an early age to frame an examination of Travers' work, informed by the Saving Mr. Banks film.
Lawson, Valerie. Mary Poppins, She Wrote: The Life of P. L. Travers. Simon & Schuster, 2013. A full biography of Travers.
Travers, P. L. "P. L. Travers, the Art of Fiction No 63." Interview by Edwina Burness and Jerry Griswold. The Paris Review, 1982, www.theparisreview.org/interviews/3099/p-l-travers-the-art-of-fiction-no-63-p-l-travers. Accessed 16 June 2017. This interview provides insight into Travers's creative process and style.