Author's Influences

Diana Wynne Jones wasn’t allowed to read many books as a child. Her father was a teacher, but he just didn’t want to buy books for his children. So it wasn’t until adulthood that Jones started to read enough to be influenced by other writers.  And when this time came, several authors were memorable enough to influence her.

            Jones admitted to being influenced by authors like E. Nesbit, George Meredith, and Joan Aiken. She even confessed that she admired Chaucer’s definition of a hero and applied it to her own works.  But the two most prominent influences in Jones’ writing were C.S. Lewis and J.R.R. Tolkien.  Both were lecturers at her university, so she was able to be directly taught by them.

            Apparently, while C.S. Lewis was a great lecturer, Tolkien just wanted to finish writing The Lord of the Rings so he tried to scare away his students with really bad lecturing.  Jones, however, stuck around and was fascinated by his words. Jones’ sentence structure resembles both Lewis’s and Tolkien’s (although it’s closer to Lewis’s) and she admitted to having gotten the idea of writing about new worlds from both authors.  Tolkien, however, was the author who provided the most inspiration to her. He showed her that it was acceptable to write fantasy. She also listened, fascinated, by his lectures about taking a basic plot and turning it into something more.  This technique is clearly shown in the majority of her writing.

            So while Jones may not have been fortunate enough to read much as a child, she made up for it as an adult. She was given the amazing opportunity to be directly influenced by two of the greatest fantasy writers of the time. Such a strong background only increased the chances of her own writing becoming great.