Anna Beer (born 24 October 1964) is a British author and lecturer, primarily known for her work as a biographer.
[1] Her particular interests as a biographer are "the relationship between literature, politics and history" (which was the basis for her life of John Milton in 2008), and the rediscovery of neglected lives, the motivation both for her book about Bess Throckmorton, the wife of Sir Walter Raleigh (2004) and her exploration of the lives and work of female composers, Sounds and Sweet Airs: the forgotten women of classical music, which was published by Oneworld Publications in 2016 and shortlisted for the Royal Philharmonic Society Awards in 2017 for Creative Communication.
[2] More recently Eve Bites Back: an Alternative History of English Literature explores the lives and work of eight authors, including Jane Austen.
In an interview in 2022 she said "every day I see something in the news that echoes a tired, sexist cliché (some more toxic than others) from the past – whether the 1400s or 1900s – and that fires me up again.
[9] In this connection, she participated in a 2023 television documentary about Fanny Mendelssohn, whose life as a composer was restricted until she was encouraged by her husband, Wilhelm Hensel.