Edward Dicey

Edward James Stephen Dicey (15 May 1832 – 7 July 1911) was an English writer, journalist, and editor.

Born at Claybrook Hall, Leicestershire, Dicey was the son of Thomas Edward Dicey, owner of the Northampton Mercury, and Anne Mary, née Stephen. He was the brother of Albert Venn Dicey.

He spent two years at King's College, London before attending Trinity College, Cambridge; during his time there he was President of the Cambridge Union during Michaelmas term 1853, and took mathematical and classical honours.^[1] After a brief but unsuccessful period as a businessman, he gravitated towards writing and became an active journalist, specializing in foreign affairs. Starting in 1860 he was a regular contributor to The Spectator, and in 1862 he became a member of the staff of the Daily Telegraph. During the 1860s he traveled extensively throughout Europe, and he journeyed to the United States and the Near East; these experiences were not only the source of his reporting, but served as the basis of a number of books as well.

After three months in 1870 as editor of the Daily News, Dicey was named editor of the Sunday weekly The Observer. He served as the editor of The Observer for nearly two decades, giving the newspaper a scholarly tone but doing little to boost its small circulation.^[2] He maintained his interest in international affairs and continued his travels abroad, particularly to Eastern Europe and Egypt. A Liberal from his early years, he broke with the party over the issue of Home Rule in the mid-1880s and became a Liberal Unionist. He was created CB in 1886.

After leaving the editorship of The Observer in 1889, Dicey continued contributing occasional pieces to the newspaper, as well as to other publications. The brother of noted jurist A. V. Dicey, he was called to the bar himself in 1875, and became a bencher of Gray's Inn in 1896, serving as its treasurer from 1903 until 1904. Dicey died at Gray's Inn, London in 1911 and is buried in Brompton Cemetery, London.^[3]

Works

• Rome in 1860 (1861)
• Cavour: A Memoir (1861)
• Six Months in the Federal States (1863)
• The Schleswig-Holstein War (1864)
• The Battle-Fields of 1866 (1866)
• A Month in Russia during the Marriage of the Czarevitch (1867)
• The Morning Land, being Sketches of Turkey, the Holy Land, and Egypt (1870)
• England and Egypt (1881)
• Victor Emmanuel (1882)
• Bulgaria, the Peasant State (1894)
• The Story of the Khedivate (1902)
• The Egypt of the Future (1907).

References

External links

• Works by Edward Dicey at Project Gutenberg

•  This article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain: Chisholm, Hugh, ed (1911). Encyclopædia Britannica (11th ed.). Cambridge University Press.