|
|
1903-1966
Evelyn Arthur St. John Waugh, novelist and journalist, was born in West Hampstead, London. His father was Arthur Waugh, a publisher and literary critic. Evelyn was educated at Lancing College, West Sussex and at Hertford College, Oxford, where he read modern history. His social activites took precedence over his academic studies. He took several teaching jobs which laid the foundations for his first novel, Decline and fall, which was published in 1928. The same year he married but was divorced within two years. He converted to Roman Catholicism, being received into the church in 1930, and his faith influenced much of his subsequent writing. He travelled widely in Europe, Near East, Africa, and America and wrote of his experiences pieces for journals. He covered the Italian invasion of Abyssinia in 1936. In 1937 he married again, to Laura Herbert and the couple went to live in Gloucestershire. He served in the Royal Marines during World War II and was a member of the British Military Mission to Yugoslavia in 1944. After the war he and his wife settled in Somerset and raised a large family. The first volume of a projected autobiography, entitled A little learning, appeared in 1964. He died on April 10, 1966 at Combe Florey, Somerset.
At Oxford, among Evelyn Waugh's circle of friends was Hugh Lygon whose father was the seventh Earl Beauchamp. Their home was Madresfield Court, near Great Malvern, Worcestershire and Evelyn became a frequent visitor and friend of the family. He was to use his connection as a basis for much of one of his best known works, Brideshead revisited (1945), both as a country house setting complete with its own chapel, and through some of the characters, although many were composites using traits from other friends and acquaintances.
Decline and fall (1928)
Vile bodies (1930)
Black mischief (1932)
A handful of dust (1934)
Scoop (1938)
Brideshead revisited (1945)
Men at arms (1952)
Officers and gentlemen (1955)
The ordeal of Gilbert Pinfold (1957)
Unconditional surrender (1962)
A little learning (1964)
Evelyn Waugh (1975)
Evelyn Waugh. 2 vols. (1986 and 1992)
Evelyn Waugh (1994)
The Literary Encyclopedia has a profile of Evelyn Waugh by Ian Littlewood, University of Sussex.
An comprehensive companion to Brideshead revisited can be found at http://www.abbotshill.freeserve.co.uk/ which has the aim of explaining references in the text.
Page created 15 April 2003 and last updated
7 April 2005
For your literary enquiries and comments please see the Who to contact page.
Please read the general terms and conditions and about accessibility on this site, including the use of the UK government accesskeys system. Further details on ICRA labelling, visitor counts and EnrichUK may be obtained by following these external links:-
|
|