Short answers, pulled from the story.
Naomi Mitchison was a Scottish novelist and poet who lived from the 1st of November 1897 to the 11th of January 1999. She wrote more than 90 books across historical fiction, science fiction, travel writing, and autobiography, and is often called a doyenne of Scottish literature. Her 1931 novel The Corn King and the Spring Queen is regarded by some as the prime 20th-century historical novel.
We Have Been Warned, published in 1935 after a journey to the Soviet Union, was Mitchison's most controversial work. It explored rape, free love, and abortion, leading her friend Victor Gollancz to refuse publication and warning that it would cause a real outcry. Files from the National Archives released in 2005 revealed that the British government had considered prosecuting its publishers.
In 1908, Mitchison and her brother John investigated Mendelian genetics, initially using guinea pigs and later switching to mice. Their findings, published as "Reduplication in Mice" in 1915, constituted the first demonstration of genetic linkage in mammals.
Mitchison was a good friend of J. R. R. Tolkien and served as one of the proof readers of The Lord of the Rings. James Watson, winner of the 1962 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine, wrote much of The Double Helix while staying with the Mitchisons and dedicated the book to her.
Mitchison visited Africa frequently and was named Mmarona, a sort of tribal mother, by the baKgatla people of Botswana. She was a personal friend of Seretse Khama and served as an advisor to the Bakgatla tribe. Her 1981 book Mucking Around described her travels across five continents over fifty years.
Mitchison was appointed Commander of the Order of the British Empire in the 1985 New Year Honours. She received honorary doctorates from the University of Stirling in 1976, the University of Dundee in 1985, Heriot-Watt University in 1990, and a DLitt from the University of Strathclyde in 1983. She was elected an Honorary Fellow of St Anne's College, Oxford, in 1980, and of Wolfson College in 1983.