Paula Byrne

Paula Byrne, Lady Bate, (born 1967), is a British author and biographer.

Byrne has a PhD from the University of Liverpool.

Byrne is the founder and chief executive of a small charity, ReLit: The Bibliotherapy Foundation, dedicated to the promotion of literature as a complementary therapy in the toolkit of medical practitioners dealing with stress, anxiety and other mental health conditions.

Byrne, who is from a large working-class Roman Catholic family in Birkenhead, is married to Sir Jonathan Bate, Shakespeare scholar and Provost of Worcester College, Oxford.

Paula Byrne's debut book was the study of Jane Austen, Jane Austen and the Theatre, which was published in 2002 by Hambledon and shortlisted for the Theatre Book Prize. An updated version, with a new chapter on stage and film adaptations of Austen, was announced for publication by HarperCollins in 2017, with the new title The Genius of Jane Austen: her love of theatre and why she is a hit in Hollywood.

In 2005 Byrne's biography Perdita: The Life of Mary Robinson was featured on the Richard & Judy Book Club on Channel 4, propelling it into the Sunday Times bestseller list. It was long listed for the Samuel Johnson Prize and contributed to a revival of interest in the work of Mary Robinson as actor, poet, novelist and proponent of women's rights.

Her book Mad World: Evelyn Waugh and the Secrets of Brideshead, another top ten bestseller, was published by HarperPress in the UK in August 2009 and HarperCollins New York in the USA in April 2010. An excerpt was published in the Sunday Times of 9 August under the headline Sex scandal behind Brideshead Revisited. An illustrated extract appeared in the April 2010 issue of Vanity Fair in advance of American publication. The book's sympathetic view of Waugh's character contrasted with the popular image of him.

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