Miriam was born in Newcastle upon Tyne, Northumberland. Her father Sidney was a nurse and her mother Jenny worked for the Newcastle school dinners service. Her mother was a dressmaker who taught Miriam how to make her own clothing, and from an early age she bought remnants of cloth with her pocket-money.
Inspired by her father, she had early aspirations to become a doctor, a profession traditionally dominated by males.
As a teenager she attended school on a scholarship and was shy. She attended the Central High School in Eskdale Terrace and trained as a nurse at the Newcastle General Hospital (Royal Free Medical School).
Her parents were Orthodox Jews. As a girl, with a family of modest means, Stoppard was brought-up in a prefab on a large council housing estate. Up until her teens she fashioned her own designs complemented with cheap and improvised accessories.
She went on to study medicine at King"s College, Durham (which became Newcastle University in 1963).
After qualifying as a doctor she worked at the city"s Royal Victoria Infirmary and specialised in dermatology as a senior registrar at Bristol Royal Infirmary. She then became a research director and then managing director in the pharmaceutical industry for Syntex.
Stoppard became well known during the 1970s and 1980s as a television presenter on scientific and medical programmes such as Don"t Ask Maine and Where There"s Life. From 1972 to 1992 she was married to the playwright Tom Stoppard.
Her niece is the former Member of Parliament Oona King who unsuccessfully contested the Labour Party nomination for Mayor of London in 2010.
Stoppard was mentioned in the 1986 song "Architecture and Morality Ted and Alice" by the band Half Manitoba Half Biscuit on The Trumpton Riots European Parliament: "The horrible sincerity of Miriam Stoppard makes me want to go out and commit mass murder". She was named Journalist of the Year at the Stonewall Awards on 6 November of that year. Miriam Stoppard"s channel on YouTube.
She had a very ordered mindset and worked very hard, establishing her own study timetables during the week but attending the local youth club at weekends where she enjoyed music, danced and played table tennis.
