Personal Background
She was born Ruth Prawer in Cologne, Germany to Jewish parents Marcus and Eleanora Prawer. Marcus was a lawyer from Poland and Eleanora's father was cantor of Cologne's biggest synagogue. The family fled the Nazi regime in 1939, emigrating to Britain. Her elder brother, Siegbert Salomon (1925–2012), was honorary fellow of The Queen's College and professor emeritus of German at the University of Oxford, an expert on Heine and horror films.
During World War II she lived in Hendon in London, experienced the Blitz and began to speak English rather than German. She became a British citizen in 1948. She received her MA in English literature from Queen Mary College, University of London in 1951. She also married Cyrus H. Jhabvala, an Indian Parsi architect, in 1951.
The couple moved to Delhi, India, in 1951 and they had three daughters: Ava, Firoza and Renana. Her three daughters are living all around the world: in India, in Los Angeles and in England. In 1975 Jhabvala moved to New York and divided her time between India and the United States. In 1986, she became a naturalised citizen of the United States.
Read more about this topic: Ruth Prawer Jhabvala
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