Pamela Brown was a British

United Kingdom

The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern IrelandIn the United Kingdom and Dependencies, other languages have been officially recognised as legitimate autochthonous languages under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages...

 writer, actress and television producer.

Literary career

Pamela Brown was just 13 when she started writing her first book, The Swish of the Curtain

The Swish of the Curtain

The Swish of the Curtain is a children's novel by Pamela Brown . It was begun in 1938 when the author was 14 but was not published until 1941. The novel has been reprinted many times and has been adapted for television and radio...

, in 1938. A year later, when World War II

World War II

World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...

  broke out, she left Colchester County High School

Colchester County High School

Colchester County High School for Girls is a selective girls' grammar school with academy status in Colchester. The school consistently scores highly in the league tables for the UK. Entrance to year 7 is by an academic selection test, the eleven plus...

 and went to live in Wales

Wales

Wales is a country that is part of the United Kingdom and the island of Great Britain, bordered by England to its east and the Atlantic Ocean and Irish Sea to its west. It has a population of three million, and a total area of 20,779 km²...

 with her family. She continued with her writing however, sending chapters of the book to her friends back in Colchester

Colchester

Colchester is an historic town and the largest settlement within the borough of Colchester in Essex, England.At the time of the census in 2001, it had a population of 104,390. However, the population is rapidly increasing, and has been named as one of Britain's fastest growing towns. As the...

, Essex

Essex

Essex is a ceremonial and non-metropolitan county in the East region of England, and one of the home counties. It is located to the northeast of Greater London. It borders with Cambridgeshire and Suffolk to the north, Hertfordshire to the west, Kent to the South and London to the south west...

, and finally finished the book when she was 16.
The Swish of the Curtain tells the story of seven stage-struck children who form an amateur theatre

Theatre

Theatre is a collaborative form of fine art that uses live performers to present the experience of a real or imagined event before a live audience in a specific place. The performers may communicate this experience to the audience through combinations of gesture, speech, song, music or dance...

 company in a town called Fenchester, Brown's made-up name for her home town of Colchester. She herself was passionate about the theatre and, from an early age, put on plays with her friends. She went on to write several sequels to her first book, and other children’s novels. Her career as an actress and television

Television

Television is a telecommunication medium for transmitting and receiving moving images that can be monochrome or colored, with accompanying sound...

 producer provided her with much detail about early television and life in repertory

Repertory

Repertory or rep, also called stock in the United States, is a term used in Western theatre and opera.A repertory theatre can be a theatre in which a resident company presents works from a specified repertoire, usually in alternation or rotation...

.

Stage career

With her earnings from The Swish of the Curtain, Brown trained as an actress at the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art

Royal Academy of Dramatic Art

The Royal Academy of Dramatic Art is a drama school located in London, United Kingdom. It is generally regarded as one of the most renowned drama schools in the world, and is one of the oldest drama schools in the United Kingdom, having been founded in 1904.RADA is an affiliate school of the...

. She worked on the professional stage as ‘Mela Brown’, to avoid confusion with another actress of the same name.

Television career

For some years, Pamela Brown produced children's programmes for BBC television

BBC Television

BBC Television is a service of the British Broadcasting Corporation. The corporation, which has operated in the United Kingdom under the terms of a Royal Charter since 1927, has produced television programmes from its own studios since 1932, although the start of its regular service of television...

. One of her final television appearances was as a guest on Blue Peter

Blue Peter

Blue Peter is the world's longest-running children's television show, having first aired in 1958. It is shown on CBBC, both in its BBC One programming block and on the CBBC channel. During its history there have been many presenters, often consisting of two women and two men at a time...

 alongside the various young actors and actresses who appeared in the television adaptation of The Swish of the Curtain, including Sarah Greene

Sarah Greene

Sarah Greene is a British television personality well known for presenting live TV: long-running series e.g. Blue Peter, from 19 May 1980 until 27 June 1983, Saturday Superstore, Going Live for 10 years and big event/awards shows.- Early life and career :Greene was born in London, England, the...

, who was later to be a Blue Peter presenter.

Works

• The Swish of the Curtain
  The Swish of the Curtain
  The Swish of the Curtain is a children's novel by Pamela Brown . It was begun in 1938 when the author was 14 but was not published until 1941. The novel has been reprinted many times and has been adapted for television and radio...
  
  (1941) novel
• Maddy Alone (1945) novel
• Golden Pavements (1947) novel
• Blue Door Venture (1949) novel
• The Children of Camp Fortuna (1949) A play in one act for children
• To be a Ballerina, and other stories (1950) short story collection
• Family Playbill (1951) novel
• The Television Twins (1952) novel
• Harlequin Corner (1953) novel
• The Windmill Family (1954) novel
• Louisa (1955) novel
• The Bridesmaids (1956) novel
• Maddy Again (1956) novel
• Back-Stage Portrait (1957)
• Showboat Summer (1957) novel
• Understudy (1958)
• As far as Singapore (1959) novel
• First House (1959) novel
• A Little Universe (1970) novel
• Summer is a Festival (1972) novel
• Looking after Libby (1974) novel
• The Girl who Ran Away (1976) novel
• Every Day is Market Day (1977) novel
• The Finishing School (1984) novel