Angus Wilson: A Biography
by By Drabble, Margaret.
Category: Biography & Autobiography , Literary

Angus Wilson (1913-1991) led one of the most remarkable and, until now, uncharted lives in the annals of twentieth-century literature. Here in this long-awaited biography, acclaimed novelist Margaret Drabble portrays Angus Wilson as one of the most brilliant writers of his time, on a par with such literary greats as Graham Greene, Kingsley Amis, and John Osborne. In this first full biography, Drabble traces Wilson's meteoric career as novelist, critic, lecturer, and man of letters.At first an assistant cataloguer at the British Museum, Wilson burst onto the literary scene like a blazing comet in 1949 with a collection of short stories called The Wrong Set. This stunning debut was followed by such memorable books as Hemlock and After, The Middle Age of Mrs. Eliot, The Old Men at the Zoo, and his most enduring and famous novel, Anglo-Saxon Attitudes.At once painfully insecure and highly narcissistic, Wilson both captivated and repelled many of the great literary figures of twentieth-century England, inspiring Rebecca West to exclaim nastily that Wilson reminded her of Jane Eyre. Yet Angus Wilson also served as a great influence for many of today's writers including Martin Amis, Jonathan Raban, V S. Pritchett, and Margaret Drabble herself. His satiric, often grotesque, but in the end sympathetic portrayal of his female characters also endeared him to millions of female readers.What makes Wilson particularly extraordinary to a new generation of readers is his decision to live life, even as early as the 1940s, as an open homosexual through his lifelong relationship with Tony Garrett and his public opposition to discriminatory homosexual laws. Above all, Angus Wilson is the portrait of an artist of enormous courage, a man who confronted challenge to the end.