Claire Tomalin is the author of several acclaimed biographies: The Life and Death of Mary Wollstonecraft; Shelley and His World; Katharine Mansfield: A Secret Life; The Invisible Woman: The Story of Ellen Ternan and Charles Dickens; Mrs. Jordans Profession; and Jane Austen. Educated at Cambridge University, she served as literary editor of the New Statesman and The Sunday Times. She lives in London with her husband, the playwright and novelist Michael Frayn.