Peter Berresford Ellis
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Peter Berresford Ellis (born 10 March 1943) is a historian, literary biographer and novelist who has published over 50 books to date under his own name and that of his pseudonym Peter Tremayne. An expert on Celtic history and culture, he is best known in Cornwall as the author of The Cornish Language and its Literature in 1974, which is still regarded as the definitive history of the language and was a set text in the Cornish Language Board's examinations.
He was born in Coventry, Warwickshire, England. His father was a Cork-born journalist who started his career on the Cork Examiner. The Ellis family can be traced in the area from 1288. His mother was from an old Sussex family of Saxon origin able to trace their lineage back through fourteen generations in the same area. Her mother was of a Breton family. With Irish, Scottish, Welsh and Breton uncles and aunts, Peter admits that he had little choice than become interested in Celtic matters. Although Peter took his degrees in Celtic Studies, obtaining a first class honours BA and his master's degree, he decided to follow his father into a career in journalism.
He began his career as a junior reporter on an English south coast weekly, becoming deputy editor of an Irish weekly newspaper and was then editor of a weekly publishing trade journal in London. He first went as a feature writer to Northern Ireland in 1964 which had a profound effect on him. His first book was published in 1968 - Wales - A Nation Again, on the Welsh struggle for political independence. It carried a foreword by Gwynfor Evans, Plaid Cymru's first Member of Parliament. In 1975 he became a full-time writer.
He used his academic background to produce many popular titles in the field of Celtic Studies and is now a Fellow of the Royal Society of Antiquaries of Ireland and a Fellow of the Royal Historical Society. He was given an Irish Post Award in 1988 in recognition of his services to Irish historical studies. In 1987 he had been inaugurated as a Bard of the Gorseth Kernow (as Gwas-an-Geltyon, the "Servant of the Celts"). This was for his work The Cornish Language and its Literature (published in 1974). He and his wife, Dorothy, had lived in Cornwall 1967-8.
He has been International Chairman of the Celtic League 1988-1990; chairman of Scrif-Celt (The Celtic Languages Book Fair in 1985 and in 1986); chairman and vice-president of the London Association for Celtic Education 1989-1995, and now is an Hon. Life Member); From 1988 he is Hon. Life President of the Scottish 1820 Society. He is a member of the Society of Authors and was a member of the Crime Writers Society. He resigned from the CWA when members of the committee, without reference to the membership, invited Jeffrey Archer as their guest of honour at their annual dinner. Archer had just served four years for perjury and perverting the course of justice. Ellis felt that members of the Society should have been consulted on such a controversial invitation. In 2002 Ellis was made an Hon. Life Member of the Irish Literary Society formed by the Nobel Literary Laureate, W.B. Yeats in 1891. The ceremony was made at an annual dinner with the current Society's President, Nobel Literary Laureate Seamus Heaney in attendance. In 2004 Ellis was accorded a Civic Welcome, Reception and Presentation by the Mayor of Cashel, County Tipperary, Councillor Tom Wood, with the unanimous agreement of the Cashel Town Council in the Council Chambers. The honour was in tribute for Ellis's Sister Fidelma books set in and around Cashel.
At the same time as his interest in the Celts, Peter has always been fascinated by aspects of popular literature and has written full-length biographies on H. Rider Haggard, W.E. Johns, Talbot Mundy as well as critical essays on many more popular fiction authors. His own output in the fictional field, writing in the genre of horror fantasy and heroic fantasy, began in 1977 when the first "Peter Tremayne" book appeared. Between 1983 and 1993 he also wrote eight adventure thrillers under the name "Peter MacAlan" .
A prolific writer, Ellis has published (as of January, 2006) a total of 87 books, 88 short stories, several pamphlets, and numerous academic papers and an uncountable number of signed articles. Under his own name he has been writing a regular column since 1987 entitled ‘Anonn is Anall’ (Here and There) for the Irish Democrat, and, since 2000, a regular fortnightly column ‘Anois agus Arís’ (Now and Again) for The Irish Post. His work has appeared in over twenty foreign languages. His books break down into 34 titles under his own name; 8 titles under the pseudonym of Peter MacAlan and 45 titles under his pseudonym of Peter Tremayne.
[edit] Novels and collections of short stories
- Absolution By Murder (1994)
- Shroud for the Archbishop (1995)
- Suffer Little Children (1995)
- The Subtle Serpent (1996)
- The Spider's Web (1997)
- Valley of the Shadow (1998)
- The Monk Who Vanished (1999)
- Act of Mercy (1999)
- Our Lady of Darkness (2000)
- Hemlock At Vespers (2000)
- Smoke in the Wind (2001)
- The Haunted Abbot (2002)
- Badger’s Moon (2003)
- Whispers of the Dead (2004)
- The Leper's Bell (2004)
- Master of Souls (2005)
- A Prayer for the Damned (2006)
