Elected: 2023
Sylvia Whitman is the director of Shakespeare and Company bookstore. Born in Paris in 1981 and educated in Edinburgh, she went on to study at University College London. In 2004, she took over management of the bookstore from her father, who had opened the shop in 1951. In 2003, she created the first Shakespeare and Company literary festival, ‘FestivalandCo.’ Shakespeare and Company has hosted a novella contest for unpublished writers. The shop published its memoirs in 2016, Shakespeare and Company, Paris: A History of the Rag & Bone Shop of the Heart.
Fellows are nominated by peers and elected by our Council of writers – our governing Board. Being elected a Fellow of the RSL is a lifetime honour. This role gives them the opportunity to support other writers, readers and the future of literature. The RSL connects writers in the Fellowship to one another, and to a wider readership.
