Delaney, Shelagh (1939– )

English dramatist. She came to prominence at the age of 19 with her play A Taste of Honey (1958), a graphic depiction of working-class life in the industrial northwest of England. The film version (1961), for which she wrote the screenplay, was one of the most widely acclaimed British films of the period. In 1963 she published a collection of short stories, Sweetly Sings the Donkey. Later plays include The House That Jack Built (1977, for television), and several notable screenplays, such as Dance With Strangers (1985).

Delaney was born in Salford, Lancashire. After leaving school at 16 she worked at a range of menial jobs before the success of A Taste of Honey, which she wrote in only two weeks. It was widely praised, both as a play and as a film, its frank realism, emotional honesty, and broad humour making it one of the most successful examples of the British ‘kitchen sink’ literature of the 1960s. Her second play The Lion in Love (1961) was less well received. She subsequently wrote for radio (So Does the Nightingale (1981)), for television (Did Your Nanny Come From Burgen? (1970)), and film (Charlie Bubbles (1968) and The Railway Man (1993)).

Her acclaimed film Dance With Strangers was based on the story of Ruth Ellis (1926–1955), the last women to be hanged in Britain for murder.