British author Penelope Fitzgerald's Human Voices was published by Collins in 1980. It is set during the height of the Blitz in 1940, when the Nazi Luftwaffe (or German Air Force), battered the United Kingdom nightly with different kinds of bombs. This killed and injured countless people, and disturbed economic activity throughout the country.
Human Voices tells the fictionalized story of a group of British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) employees who are living and working in a concert hall in London, working hard to escape the perils of the Blitz while trying to create news programs for the general public. While bombs are exploding outside of the concert hall, however, there is an internal power struggle going on at the BBC. Two program directors are vying for control of the station; at the same time, there are personal and interpersonal conflicts going on all around the corporation.
Fitzgerald played an integral part in the war effort. In 1940, she worked for the Ministry of Food, which distributed food to people across the country as it was ravaged by war. After her stint at the Ministry of Food, Fitzgerald became a producer at the BBC, which was her primary inspiration for writing Human Voices. And though Human Voices was published nearly 40 years after her work at the BBC began, it is still a deeply personal story for Fitzgerald.
When it was published, Human Voices received very positive reviews. In 1999, for instance, Library Journal wrote that Fitzgerald's novel "brings time, place, and characters to life in a book remarkable for its dexterous and appealing prose." The New York Times felt similarly, writing that the novel was brilliant for its use of "understated comedy," its characters, and its writing.
