Muriel Spark to be honoured in first ever memorial dedicated to a woman in Edinburgh's Princes Street Gardens

The initiative, which is fully funded by long-standing Edinburgh philanthropists Morag and James Anderson, will launch an open competition for the design of the memorial later this month.

The project has the full support of Penelope Jardine, Spark’s companion for three decades as well as backing from leading figures across Scotland’s literary and visual arts and cultural and civic life.

Edinburgh notoriously has few statues of women, with fewer than ten currently standing in the city. However, there are 79 statues of men and around 15 of animals, including Wojtek the Bear in Princes Street Gardens.

Hailed as “one of the world’s greatest writers”, Ms Spark’s 22 novels, including The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie, have shaped modern literature and inspired readers worldwide. As the twentieth anniversary of her death approaches, the memorial will reaffirm Spark’s standing alongside Sir Walter Scott and Robert Louis Stevenson as a defining figure in Edinburgh’s literary heritage.

Born in Edinburgh in 1918 as Muriel Camberg, she lived on Bruntsfield Place and attended the then James Gillespie’s High School for Girls, where one of her teachers, Christina Kay, was to provide the inspiration for her best-known novel.

In 2018, a pathway in the city’s Bruntsfield district and a flight of steps off the Grassmarket used for the filming of the 1969 big-screen adaption of The Prime Of Miss Jean Brodie starring Dame Maggie Smith, were named after the author to mark the centenary of her birth.

Spark left Edinburgh aged 19 when she met and married Sydney Oswald Spark, and the couple moved to Southern Rhodesia. She moved to London in 1944 when the marriage broke up shortly after the birth of their son, Robin.

She died in Italy in 2006.

The memorial, which will be sited in a quiet, contemplative space south of the railway line in East Princes Street Gardens, aims to celebrate Spark’s creative spirit while addressing the historical absence of women commemorated within the Gardens.

An open competition will be launched on 19 November to select the artist who will design and create the memorial. The process, overseen by a judging panel and guided by a robust governance structure, is designed to ensure transparency and excellence. The commissioners have committed to covering all costs, including design, installation, and long-term maintenance in line with the City of Edinburgh Council’s Public Art Policy.

Author Sir Ian Rankin, who is backing the initiative, said: “Muriel Spark was one of the 20th century’s finest novelists. She also captured the very essence of Edinburgh, her birthplace, in her best-known story, The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie. Just as Edinburgh can seem like a Tardis - bigger on the inside than the outside - so Muriel Spark’s slender works contain a vastness of riches.

“She can be satirical and profound, experimental in style and yet with storytelling skills shaped by tradition. She continues to fascinate, entertain and confound. It is wonderful that her impact and legacy are to be memorialised in Princes Street Gardens - the first woman to be celebrated in this way. The crème de la crème indeed.”

Philanthropists and fund managers Mr and Ms Anderson, are funding the project. Mr Anderson is a director of Hearts FC and has donated millions to Scottish football. as well as arts organisations and other charities including Médecins Sans Frontières (Doctors Without Borders) and Save the Children.