Help me find this shy 20th-century British male writer
October 11, 2015 5:57 PM Subscribe
Two or so years ago, I read the beginning of a biography of a writer, probably a poet. I know he was a young man in England during World War I who was not able to serve in the war due to a medical condition. But that is all I am certain about -- I have vague memories of a few further details that I could easily be confusing with stories from other people's lives, or even from novels.
1) He attended either Oxford or Cambridge, and due to said medical condition was one of only a few classmates who stayed on at university during the war. There was a description of walking around the college grounds that were almost completely bare of students, and living in the residence halls whilst they were being used to house soldiers.
2) Early in his university career he was invited to a party at a country house belonging to one of his professors (whose wife was, I believe, also famous?). He was too shy to speak a single word during the party, but the hostess found him so charming nonetheless that he was immediately invited back for another party.
3) The biography excerpted letters he wrote to his childhood sweetheart, one of which MAY have mentioned a game of chess they had played.
Sorry this is so imprecise! I'm hoping the further details could jog someone's memory. I would love to identify the author in question, or even the particular biography I began to read.
1) He attended either Oxford or Cambridge, and due to said medical condition was one of only a few classmates who stayed on at university during the war. There was a description of walking around the college grounds that were almost completely bare of students, and living in the residence halls whilst they were being used to house soldiers.
2) Early in his university career he was invited to a party at a country house belonging to one of his professors (whose wife was, I believe, also famous?). He was too shy to speak a single word during the party, but the hostess found him so charming nonetheless that he was immediately invited back for another party.
3) The biography excerpted letters he wrote to his childhood sweetheart, one of which MAY have mentioned a game of chess they had played.
Sorry this is so imprecise! I'm hoping the further details could jog someone's memory. I would love to identify the author in question, or even the particular biography I began to read.
TS Eliot. He attended Oxford during the Great War, but as an American he wouldn't have served in the war.
posted by robcorr at 7:32 PM on October 11, 2015 [2 favorites]
posted by robcorr at 7:32 PM on October 11, 2015 [2 favorites]
That sounds like Philip Larkin, but he was World War II.
posted by désoeuvrée at 12:32 AM on October 12, 2015
posted by désoeuvrée at 12:32 AM on October 12, 2015
Best answer: I wonder if it is Aldous Huxley. He went up to Balliol College, Oxford in 1914 having been rejected for military service due to poor sight in one eye. He was famously shy as an undergraduate, and was one of the students invited to Lady Ottoline Morrell's salons at Garsington Manor just outside Oxford.
posted by greycap at 12:38 AM on October 12, 2015
posted by greycap at 12:38 AM on October 12, 2015
TS Eliot. He attended Oxford during the Great War, but as an American he wouldn't have served in the war.
He tried to enlist with the U.S., but was rejected for physical reasons, bolstering the case that this is him. He also did have a childhood sweetheart whom he left behind him.
However, the "Game of Chess" in The Waste Land is not autobiographical, but rather seems to be a reference to the chess game depicted in the play Women Beware Women. Eliot was also not much of a shy wallflower; as an undergrad, he wrote vulgar rhymes to try to impress his fellow male students. He was also considered very socially skilled thanks to his upbringing; he fit in much better at social gatherings than Ezra Pound, for example.
posted by kewb at 3:50 AM on October 12, 2015
He tried to enlist with the U.S., but was rejected for physical reasons, bolstering the case that this is him. He also did have a childhood sweetheart whom he left behind him.
However, the "Game of Chess" in The Waste Land is not autobiographical, but rather seems to be a reference to the chess game depicted in the play Women Beware Women. Eliot was also not much of a shy wallflower; as an undergrad, he wrote vulgar rhymes to try to impress his fellow male students. He was also considered very socially skilled thanks to his upbringing; he fit in much better at social gatherings than Ezra Pound, for example.
posted by kewb at 3:50 AM on October 12, 2015
Best answer: My undergrad speciality was TS Eliot and this is not him. Really not him unless most of these details involve other people.
Variety of options here ranging from Bloomsbury group people like EM Forster to later writers like Evelyn Waugh or Aldous Huxley. I'd prob take a look at the Penguin History of British Literature (the multi-volume one) and look at the early 20th century section.
posted by kariebookish at 4:12 AM on October 12, 2015
Variety of options here ranging from Bloomsbury group people like EM Forster to later writers like Evelyn Waugh or Aldous Huxley. I'd prob take a look at the Penguin History of British Literature (the multi-volume one) and look at the early 20th century section.
posted by kariebookish at 4:12 AM on October 12, 2015
Response by poster: It was Huxley indeed! Thank you very, very much. The biography in question was Nicholas Murray's.
It quotes a letter in which Huxley writes "You ought to see Balliol now - it's too curious. There are only about 60 undergraduates up and the whole of the front quad is filled with soldiers: there are 250 of them there, sleeping four or five in a room - a lot in my old room" - this was the description I recall.
The salons at Garsington were the parties I was thinking of; Lady Ottoline was not a professor's wife, but I was undoubtedly confusing this with Huxley having lived around the same time with a Professor and Mrs Haldane. Ottoline described Huxley on his first visit as "rather silent and aloof".
I'm not sure where I got the chess game - looking at the book that seems to have been a red herring. The "childhood sweetheart" I remembered was Jelly D'Aranyi.
posted by jeudi at 6:26 AM on October 12, 2015 [1 favorite]
It quotes a letter in which Huxley writes "You ought to see Balliol now - it's too curious. There are only about 60 undergraduates up and the whole of the front quad is filled with soldiers: there are 250 of them there, sleeping four or five in a room - a lot in my old room" - this was the description I recall.
The salons at Garsington were the parties I was thinking of; Lady Ottoline was not a professor's wife, but I was undoubtedly confusing this with Huxley having lived around the same time with a Professor and Mrs Haldane. Ottoline described Huxley on his first visit as "rather silent and aloof".
I'm not sure where I got the chess game - looking at the book that seems to have been a red herring. The "childhood sweetheart" I remembered was Jelly D'Aranyi.
posted by jeudi at 6:26 AM on October 12, 2015 [1 favorite]
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posted by Oyéah at 6:17 PM on October 11, 2015 [3 favorites]