Francis King
Francis Henry King, CBE (4 March 1923 – 3 July 2011)[1] was a British novelist, poet and short story writer.
Early life
He was born on March 4, 1923 in Adelboden, Switzerland, brought up in India and educated at Shrewsbury School and Balliol College, Oxford. During World War II he was a conscientious objector, and left Oxford to work on the land. After completing his degree in 1949 he worked for the British Council; he was posted around Europe, and then in Kyoto. He resigned to write full time in 1964.
Career
He was a past winner of the W. Somerset Maugham Prize for his novel The Dividing Stream (1951) and also won the Katherine Mansfield Short Story Prize. His 1956 book "The Firewalkers" was published pseudonymously under the name Frank Cauldwell.
A President Emeritus of International PEN and a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature, he was appointed an Officer (OBE) of the Order of the British Empire in 1979 and a Commander of the Order (CBE) in 1985.[1]
Personal life
King came out as homosexual in the 1970s. He described the relationship in Yesterday Came Suddenly (1993), after his long-term partner had died from AIDS in 1988 King suffered a stroke in 2005.
Death
Francis King died on 3 July 2011 at the age of 88.[2]
Works
- To the Dark Tower (1946) novel
- Never Again (1948) novel
- An Air That Kills (1948) novel
- The Dividing Stream (1951) novel, 1952 Somerset Maugham Award
- Rod of Incantation (1952) poems
- The Dark Glasses (1954) novel
- The Firewalkers: a Memoir (1956) (wrote under the name Frank Cauldwell)
- The Man on the Rock (1957) novel
- The Widow (1957) novel
- The Custom House (1961) novel
- The Japanese Umbrella and Other Stories (1964) – short stories
- The Last Pleasure Gardens (1965)
- The Waves Behind the Boat (1967) novel
- Robert de Montesquiou by Philippe Julian (1967) – translator, along with John Haylock
- The Brighton Belle and other stories (1968)
- The Domestic Animal (1970) novel
- Flights (1973)
- A Game of Patience (1974)
- The Needle (1975)
- E.M. Forster and his World (1978) – a biography of the author of A Passage to India and Howards End
- Act of Darkness (1983)
- Voices in an Empty Room (1984)
- Visiting Cards (1990)
- Punishments (1989)
- The Ant Colony (1992)
- Yesterday Came Suddenly (1993) – autobiography
- The Nick of Time (2002) novel
- The Sunlight on the Garden (2006) – short stories
- With My Little Eye (2007) novel
References
External links
Persondata |
Name |
King, Francis Henry |
Alternative names |
|
Short description |
British novelist, writer and poet |
Date of birth |
4 March 1923 |
Place of birth |
Adelboden, Switzerland |
Date of death |
3 July 2011 |
Place of death |
|