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Jessica Duchen’s latest novel, Hungarian Dances, will be published by Hodder & Stoughton on 6 March 2008, following wide acclaim for Rites of Spring and Alicia’s Gift. She is currently working on a fourth novel.
Jessica was born in London, where her parents settled after leaving South Africa in the 1950s. She regrets that she can’t remember her encounter with JR Tolkein in Oxford at the age of six, which has become a family legend. She first attempted to write a novel at the age of 12. Her early efforts later found their way into the hands of a distinguished author and a literary agent, who both provided valuable encouragement. Her first article was published in The Strad while she was still a student. Her official first novel, Rites of Spring, was published by Hodder & Stoughton in 2006. |
As a journalist, she writes regularly for The Independent and has interviewed most of the world’s finest musicians (see Archive). Her work appears frequently in BBC Music Magazine, The Strad and Classic FM Magazine; she has also contributed to The Guardian, The New Statesman and Gramophone. She has given pre-concert talks at the Barbican, Wigmore and Royal Festival Halls and served on the juries of the Royal Philharmonic Society Awards and the BBC Music Magazine CD Awards.
For the stage, Jessica enjoys creating ‘literary concerts’ for musicians and actors. Her first play, A Walk Through the End of Time, a one-act drama introducing Messiaen’s Quartet for the End of Time, was commissioned by the Consonances Festival, St Nazaire, in 2007 and won her the Medal of the Town of St Nazaire.
As biographer, Jessica has tackled the life and work of the composers Erich Wolfgang Korngold and Gabriel Fauré (see Books). She wrote the text for 'Inside London', Dorothy Bohm’s photographic portrait of the city, and has published several short stories.
Jessica married violinist Tom Eisner in 1998. She enjoys the company of her family, cooking for her many beloved friends, and the presence of Solti, the ginger cat. She reads widely and loves cinema, theatre, ballet and art. She has no hobbies, only a way of life.
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