Norma Clarke is a writer and literary historian whose publications include Dr Johnson's Women, The Rise and Fall of the Woman of Letters, Queen of the Wits, and Brothers of the Quill, as well as five novels for children. She is currently Professor Emeritus in English Literature and Creative Writing at Kingston University. Not Speaking is a memoir of her family: of her beautiful and vivacious Greek mother, her working-class father and her five siblings, including the celebrity hairdresser Nicky Clarke.