Maureen Chadwick

Chadwick was born in Aldershot in Hampshire. In her home town 'Chad' Chadwick attended East End Junior School and the all-girls Aldershot County High School where she developed an interest in art and in stage production. Deciding to be a painter, she attended the University of Edinburgh, but, as this was the time the Gay Liberation Front was being launched, she left after two months and returned home to be nearer London, joining Farnham School of Art in nearby Farnham, Surrey. Whilst there she visited The Gateways, a lesbian club in Chelsea made famous in the film The Killing of Sister George (1968), one of the earliest mainstream films to feature lesbianism. For many women, including Chadwick, a visit to the Gateways was their first introduction to lesbian life. In 1971, after her third attempt, Chadwick finally got in when she realised she had to apply for membership, having the necessary admission card sent to her at the art college she was attending rather than the parental home:

Each time requiring cash for a train ticket up to London and a lie to my parents about why. I was wearing what I hoped was a killer combination of black jeans, lilac crepe shirt, chiffon scarf and Susannah York-style makeup. As a complete ingenue, I knew I would have to contrive to get picked up by someone older and sophisticated – and, crucially, before the club closed at 11pm. So I just stood in the middle of the dancefloor, oozing availability but rebuffing undesirables, until someone finally took the bait.

In her early 20s Chadwick moved to Bristol and became an active member of the Women's Liberation Movement there. She gained a post as a data-processing librarian, where, finding she had a great deal of time on her hands, she started to write scripts, eventually getting an agent and commencing her writing career.