'A joy full of excitement'

 

“Learning should be a joy and full of excitement. It is life's greatest adventure; it is an illustrated excursion into the minds of the noble and the learned.” – Taylor Caldwell

 

Born in England this date in 1900, Caldwell emigrated to the U.S. in 1907 and spent many of her formative years living in poverty after her father died.  That experience, she said, not only shaped her values but also her expectations – to never again live in fear of want.

 

A writer even before leaving England (where she won a Charles Dickens Prize for young writers) Caldwell began her prolific professional writing career after earning a degree from the University of Buffalo.  Her first novel Dynasty of Death was an instant bestseller and established her as a major new writer.  Over the next 50 years – she died in 1985 – Caldwell published some 50 books under her own name and the pen names Marcus Holland, Max Reiner and J. Miriam Reback.

 

Noted for masterful blending of historical events with her own vivid imagination, she wrote such bestsellers as Dear and Glorious Physician (about Saint Luke), The Earth is the Lord's (about Genghis Khan), and Captains and the Kings.   Her books have sold upward of 40 million copies worldwide. 

She believed firmly in education and hard work.  “I wanted to acquire an education, work extremely hard, and never deviate from my goal to make it.”