Janet McNeill
| Janet McNeill | |
|---|---|
 |
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| Born | September 14, 1907 Dublin, Ireland |
| Died | October 1994 (age 87) Bristol, United Kingdom |
| Occupation | Novelist, playwright |
| Nationality | Irish |
| Subject | Mid-20th century Northern Ireland |
Janet McNeill (14 September 1907 – October 1994) was a prolific Irish novelist and playwright. Author of more than 20 children's books, as well as adult novels, plays, and two opera libretti, she was best known for her children's comic fantasy series My Friend Specs McCann.
Janet McNeill was born on 14 September 1907 in Dublin to Rev. William McNeill, a minister at Adelaide Road Presbyterian Church, and Jeannie Patterson (Hogg) McNeill. In 1913 the family moved to Birkenhead, Merseyside, England, where her father became minister at Trinity Road Church. McNeill attended public school in Birkenhead and studied classics at the University of St Andrews, completing a MA degree in 1929. While in university, she was involved in writing and acting with the College Players. In 1924 the family returned to Ireland due to her father's failing health, and Rev. McNeill became the minister of a village church in Rostrevor, County Down, Northern Ireland while Janet joined the Belfast Telegraph as a secretary.
In 1933 she married Robert Alexander, the chief engineer in the Belfast city surveyor's department, and the couple settled in Lisburn, where they raised their four sons. Though she planned to write her first novel early on, McNeill found it impossible to write seriously until the children grew up, saying: "It was four years before I had a baby and twenty five before I produced the book".
In 1946 McNeill won a prize in a BBC competition for her play Gospel Truth. She began writing radio dramas, which were broadcast by the BBC. She suffered a cerebral hemorrhage in 1953. During her recovery, she began writing novels both for adults and children, producing a large body of work between 1955 and 1964. Her popular children's character, Specs McCann, who debuted in a 1955 book and made several reappearances, also inspired a newspaper cartoon strip by Rowel Friers, a Belfast artist and friend of McNeill's.
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