From her Everest scoop to her journey as a trans woman, the author’s authoritative voice and questioning mind found an eager audience
Jan Morris, the historian and travel writer who evoked time and place with the flair of a novelist, has died aged 94.
As a journalist Morris broke monumental news, including Hillary and Norgay’s ascent of Everest, and the French involvement in the Israeli attack on Egypt in the Suez war. As a bestselling author of more than 30 books, she was equally lauded for histories including Pax Britannica, her monumental account of the British Empire, and for her colourful accounts of places from Venice to Oxford, Hong Kong to Trieste. But she was also well-known as a transgender pioneer, with Conundrum, her account of the journey from man to woman, an international sensation when it was published in 1974.
