Alan Sillitoe

FRSL The Royal Society of Literature (RSL) is a learned society founded in 1820 by George IV of the United Kingdom, King George IV to "reward literary merit and excite literary talent". A charity that represents the voice of literature in the UK, the ...

(4 March 192825 April 2010) was an English writer and one of the so-called " angry young men" of the 1950s. He disliked the label, as did most of the other writers to whom it was applied. He is best known for his

debut novel A debut novel is the first novel a novelist publishes. Debut novels are often the author's first opportunity to make an impact on the publishing industry, and thus the success or failure of a debut novel can affect the ability of the author to pu ...

'' Saturday Night and Sunday Morning'' and his early short story " The Loneliness of the Long Distance Runner", both of which were adapted into films.

Biography

Sillitoe was born in

Nottingham Nottingham ( , East Midlands English, locally ) is a City status in the United Kingdom, city and Unitary authorities of England, unitary authority area in Nottinghamshire, East Midlands, England. It is located south-east of Sheffield and nor ...

to working-class parents, Christopher Sillitoe and Sabina (née Burton). Like Arthur Seaton, the anti-hero of his first novel, '' Saturday Night and Sunday Morning'', his father worked at the

Raleigh Bicycle Company The Raleigh Bicycle Company is a British bicycle manufacturer based in Nottingham, England and founded by Woodhead and Angois in 1885. Using Raleigh as their brand name, it is one of the oldest bicycle companies in the world. After being acquir ...

's factory in the town. His father was illiterate, violent, and unsteady with his jobs, and the family was often on the brink of starvation. Sillitoe left school at the age of 14, having failed the entrance examination to

grammar school A grammar school is one of several different types of school in the history of education in the United Kingdom and other English-speaking countries, originally a Latin school, school teaching Latin, but more recently an academically oriented Se ...

. He worked at the Raleigh factory for the next four years, spending his free time reading prodigiously and being a "serial lover of local girls". He joined the

Air Training Corps The Air Training Corps (ATC) is a British Youth organisations in the United Kingdom, volunteer youth organisation; aligned to, and fostering the knowledge and learning of military values, primarily focusing on military aviation. Part of the ...

in 1942, then the

Royal Air Force The Royal Air Force (RAF) is the Air force, air and space force of the United Kingdom, British Overseas Territories and Crown Dependencies. It was formed towards the end of the World War I, First World War on 1 April 1918, on the merger of t ...

(RAF), albeit too late to serve in the

Second World War World War II or the Second World War (1 September 1939 – 2 September 1945) was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War II, Allies and the Axis powers. World War II by country, Nearly all of the wo ...

. He served as a wireless operator in Malaya during the

Emergency An emergency is an urgent, unexpected, and usually dangerous situation that poses an immediate risk to health, life, property, or environment and requires immediate action. Most emergencies require urgent intervention to prevent a worsening ...

. After returning to Britain, he was planning to enlist in the

Royal Canadian Air Force The Royal Canadian Air Force (RCAF; ) is the air and space force of Canada. Its role is to "provide the Canadian Forces with relevant, responsive and effective airpower". The RCAF is one of three environmental commands within the unified Can ...

when it was discovered that he had

tuberculosis Tuberculosis (TB), also known colloquially as the "white death", or historically as consumption, is a contagious disease usually caused by ''Mycobacterium tuberculosis'' (MTB) bacteria. Tuberculosis generally affects the lungs, but it can al ...

. He spent 16 months in an RAF hospital. Pensioned off at the age of 21 on 45 shillings (£2.25) a week, he lived in France and Spain for seven years in an attempt to recover. In 1955, while living in

Mallorca Mallorca, or Majorca, is the largest of the Balearic Islands, which are part of Spain, and the List of islands in the Mediterranean#By area, seventh largest island in the Mediterranean Sea. The capital of the island, Palma, Majorca, Palma, i ...

with the American poet Ruth Fainlight, whom he married in 1959, and in contact with the poet

Robert Graves Captain Robert von Ranke Graves (24 July 1895 – 7 December 1985) was an English poet, soldier, historical novelist and critic. His father was Alfred Perceval Graves, a celebrated Irish poet and figure in the Gaelic revival; they were b ...

, Sillitoe started work on ''Saturday Night and Sunday Morning'', which was published in 1958. Influenced in part by the stripped-down prose of

Ernest Hemingway Ernest Miller Hemingway ( ; July 21, 1899 – July 2, 1961) was an American novelist, short-story writer and journalist. Known for an economical, understated style that influenced later 20th-century writers, he has been romanticized fo ...

, the book conveys the attitudes and situation of a young factory worker faced with the inevitable end of his youthful philandering. As with

John Osborne John James Osborne (12 December 1929 – 24 December 1994) was an English playwright, screenwriter, actor, and entrepreneur, who is regarded as one of the most influential figures in post-war theatre. Born in London, he briefly worked as a jo ...

's '' Look Back in Anger'' (1956) and John Braine's '' Room at the Top'' (1957), the novel's real subject was the disillusionment of post-war Britain and the lack of opportunities for the working class. ''Saturday Night and Sunday Morning'' was adapted as a film with the same name by

Karel Reisz Karel Reisz (21 July 1926 – 25 November 2002) was a Czech-born British filmmaker and film critic, one of the pioneers of the new realist strain in British cinema during the 1950s and 1960s. Two of the best-known films he directed are '' Satur ...

in 1960, with

Albert Finney Albert Finney (9 May 1936 – 7 February 2019) was an English actor. He attended the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art and worked in the theatre before attaining fame for movie acting during the early 1960s, debuting with '' The Entertainer'' ( ...

as Arthur Seaton; the screenplay was written by Sillitoe. Sillitoe's story ''The Loneliness of the Long Distance Runner'', which concerns the rebellion of a borstal boy with a talent for running, won the

Hawthornden Prize The Hawthornden Prize is a British literary award given annually to a British, Irish or British-based author for a work of "imaginative literature" – including poetry, novels, history, biography and creative non-fiction – published in the pre ...

in 1959. It was also adapted into a

film A film, also known as a movie or motion picture, is a work of visual art that simulates experiences and otherwise communicates ideas, stories, perceptions, emotions, or atmosphere through the use of moving images that are generally, sinc ...

, in 1962, directed by

Tony Richardson Cecil Antonio Richardson (5 June 1928 – 14 November 1991) was an English theatre and film director, producer and screenwriter, whose career spanned five decades. He was identified with the "angry young men" group of British directors and play ...

and starring Tom Courtenay. Sillitoe again wrote the screenplay. With Fainlight he had a child, David. They later adopted another, Susan. Sillitoe lived at various times in

Kent Kent is a Ceremonial counties of England, ceremonial county in South East England. It is bordered by Essex across the Thames Estuary to the north, the Strait of Dover to the south-east, East Sussex to the south-west, Surrey to the west, and Gr ...

, London and

Montpellier Montpellier (; ) is a city in southern France near the Mediterranean Sea. One of the largest urban centres in the region of Occitania (administrative region), Occitania, Montpellier is the prefecture of the Departments of France, department of ...

. In London he was friendly with the bookseller Bernard Stone (who had been born in Nottingham a few years before Sillitoe) and became one of the bohemian crowd that congregated at Stone's Turret Bookshop on Kensington Church Walk. In the 1960s Sillitoe was celebrated in the

Soviet Union The Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR), commonly known as the Soviet Union, was a List of former transcontinental countries#Since 1700, transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 until Dissolution of the Soviet ...

as a spokesman for the "oppressed worker" in the West. Invited to tour the country, he visited several times in the 1960s and in 1968 he was asked to address the Congress of Soviet Writers' Unions, where he denounced Soviet human rights abuses, many of which he had witnessed. In 1990 Sillitoe was awarded an honorary degree by Nottingham Polytechnic, now

Nottingham Trent University Nottingham Trent University (NTU) is a public research university located in Nottingham, England. Its origins date back to 1843 with the establishment of the Nottingham School of Design, Nottingham Government School of Design, which still opera ...

. The city's older

Russell Group The Russell Group is a self-selected association of twenty-four public research universities in the United Kingdom. The group is headquartered in Cambridge and was established in 1994 to represent its members' interests, principally to governme ...

university, the

University of Nottingham The University of Nottingham is a public research university in Nottingham, England. It was founded as University College Nottingham in 1881, and was granted a royal charter in 1948. Nottingham's main campus (University Park Campus, Nottingh ...

, also awarded him an honorary D.Litt. in 1994. In 2006 his best-known play was staged at the university's Lakeside Arts theatre in an in-house production. Sillitoe wrote many novels and several volumes of poems. His autobiography, ''Life Without Armour'', which was critically acclaimed on publication in 1995, offers a view of his squalid childhood. In an interview Sillitoe claimed that "A writer, if he manages to earn a living at what he's doing, even if it's a very poor living, acquires some of the attributes of the old-fashioned gentleman (if I can be so silly)." ''Gadfly in Russia'', an account of his travels in Russia spanning 40 years, was published in 2007. In 2008, London Books republished ''A Start in Life'' in its London Classics series to mark the author's 80th birthday. Sillitoe appeared on ''

Desert Island Discs ''Desert Island Discs'' is a radio programme broadcast on BBC Radio 4. It was first broadcast on the BBC Forces Programme on 29 January 1942. Each week a guest, called a " castaway" during the programme, is asked to choose eight audio recordin ...

'' on

BBC Radio 4 BBC Radio 4 is a British national radio station owned and operated by the BBC. The station replaced the BBC Home Service on 30 September 1967 and broadcasts a wide variety of spoken-word programmes from the BBC's headquarters at Broadcasti ...

on 25 January 2009. Sillitoe's long-held desire for ''Saturday Night and Sunday Morning'' to be remade for a contemporary filmgoing audience was never achieved, despite strong efforts. Danny Brocklehurst was to adapt the book and Sillitoe gave his blessing to the project, but Tony Richardson's estate and Woodfall Films prevented it from going ahead. Sillitoe was elected a Fellow of the

Royal Society of Literature The Royal Society of Literature (RSL) is a learned society founded in 1820 by King George IV to "reward literary merit and excite literary talent". A charity that represents the voice of literature in the UK, the RSL has about 800 Fellows, elect ...

in 1997.

Death

Highgate Cemetery - East - Alan Sillitoe 02

Sillitoe died of cancer on 25 April 2010 at Charing Cross Hospital in London. He was 82. He is buried in

Highgate Cemetery Highgate Cemetery is a place of burial in North London, England, designed by architect Stephen Geary. There are approximately 170,000 people buried in around 53,000 graves across the West and East sides. Highgate Cemetery is notable both for so ...

Works

Novels

* '' Saturday Night and Sunday Morning'', London: Allen, 1958; New York: Knopf, 1959. New edition (1968) has an introduction by Sillitoe, commentary and notes by David Craig. Longman edition (1976) has a sequence of Nottingham photographs, and stills from the film, Harlow. * '' The General'', London: Allen, 1960; New York: Knopf, 1961 * '' Key to the Door'', London: Allen, 1961; New York: Knopf, 1962; reprinted, with a new preface by Sillitoe, London: Allen, 1978 * '' The Death of William Posters'', London: Allen, 1965; New York: Knopf, 1965 * ''A Tree on Fire'', London: Macmillan, 1967; Garden City, NY: Doubleday, 1968 * '' A Start in Life'', London: Allen, 1970; New York: Scribners, 1971 * ''Travels in Nihilon'', London: Allen, 1971; New York: Scribners, 1972 * ''The Flame of Life'', London: Allen, 1974 * '' The Widower's Son'', Allen, 1976; New York: Harper & Row, 1977 * ''The Storyteller'', London: Allen, 1979; New York: Simon & Schuster, 1980. * ''Her Victory'', London: Granada, 1982; New York: Watts, 1982 * ''The Lost Flying Boat'', London: Granada, 1983; Boston: Little, Brown, 1983 * ''Down from the Hill'', London: Granada, 1984 * ''Life Goes On'', London: Granada, 1985 * ''Out of the Whirlpool''. London: Hutchinson, 1987 * '' The Open Door'', London: Grafton/Collins, 1989 * ''Last Loves'', London: Grafton, 1990; Boston: Chivers, 1991 * ''Leonard's War: A Love Story''. London: HarperCollins, 1991 * ''Snowstop'', London: HarperCollins, 1993 * ''The Broken Chariot'', London: Flamingo/HarperCollins, 1998 * ''The German Numbers Woman'', London: Flamingo/HarperCollins, 1999 * ''Birthday'', London: Flamingo/HarperCollins, 2001 * ''A Man of His Time'', Flamingo (UK), 2004, ; Harper Perennial (US), 2005. ;

Collections of short stories

* '' The Loneliness of the Long Distance Runner'', London: Allen, 1959; New York: Knopf, 1960 * ''The Ragman’s Daughter and Other Stories'', London: Allen, 1963; New York: Knopf, 1964 * ''Guzman, Go Home, and Other Stories'', London: Macmillan, 1968; Garden City, NY: Doubleday, 1969; reprinted, with a new preface by Sillitoe, London; Allen, 1979 * ''Men, Women and Children'', London: Allen, 1973; New York: Scribners, 1974 * ''Down to the Bone'', Exeter: Wheaton, 1976 * ''The Second Chance and Other Stories'', London: Cape, 1981; New York: Simon & Schuster, 1981 * ''The Far Side of the Street: Fifteen Short Stories'', London: Allen, 1988 * ''Alligator Playground: A Collection of Short Stories'', Flamingo, 1997, * ''New and Collected Stories'', Carroll and Graf, 2005.

Compilations

* ''Every Day of the Week: An Alan Sillitoe Reader'', with an introduction by John Sawkins London: Allen, 1987 * ''Collected Stories'', London: Flamingo, 1995; New York: HarperCollins, 1996

Writing for children

* ''The City Adventures of Marmalade Jim'', London: Macmillan, 1967; Toronto: Macmillan, 1967; revised ed., London: Robson, 1977 * ''Big John and the Stars'', London: Robson, 1977 * ''The Incredible Fencing Fleas'', London: Robson, 1978. Illus. Mike Wilks. * ''Marmalade Jim at the Farm'', London: Robson, 1980 * ''Marmalade Jim and the Fox'', London: Robson, 1984

Essays/travel

* ''Road to Volgograd'', London: Allen, 1964; New York: Knopf, 1964 * ''Raw Material'', London: Allen, 1972; New York: Scribners, 1973; rev. ed., London: Pan Books, 1974; further revised, London: Star Books, 1978; further revised, London: Allen, 1979 * ''Mountains and Caverns: Selected Essays'', London: Allen, 1975 * ''Words Broadsheet Nineteen'', by Sillitoe and Ruth Fainlight. Bramley, Surrey: Words Press, 1975. Broadside * ''"The Interview"'', London: The 35s (Women's Campaign for Soviet Jewry), 1976 * ''Israel: Poems on a Hebrew Theme'', with drawings by Ralph Steadman; London: Steam Press, 1981 98 copies. * ''The Saxon Shore Way: From Gravesend to Rye'', by Sillitoe and Fay Godwin. London: Hutchinson, 1983 * ''Alan Sillitoe’s Nottinghamshire'', with photographs by David Sillitoe. London: Grafton, 1987 * ''Shylock the Writer'', London: Turret Bookshop, 1991 * ''The Mentality of the Picaresque Hero'', London: Turret Bookshop, 1993, Turret Papers, no. 2. (500 copies) * ''Leading the Blind: A Century of Guidebook Travel. 1815-1914'', London: Macmillan, 1995 * ''Gadfly in Russia'', JR Books, 2007

Plays

* ''Three Plays'', London: Allen, 1978 Contains ''The Slot-Machine'', ''The Interview'', ''Pit Strike''

Autobiography

*''Life Without Armour'', (HarperCollins, 1995) ,

Collections of poems

* ''Without Beer or Bread'', Dulwich Village: Outposts, 1957 * ''The Rats and Other Poems'', London: Allen, 1960 * ''Falling Out of Love and Other Poems'', London; Allen, 1964; Garden City, NY: Doubleday, 1964 * ''Shaman and Other Poems"'', Turret, 1968 (Limited ed. of 500 copies, 100 copies signed and numbered) * ''Love in the Environs of Voronezh and Other Poems'', London: Macmillan, 1968; Garden City, NY: Doubleday, 1969. * ''Poems'', by Sillitoe, Ruth Fainlight and Ted Hughes; London: Rainbow Press, 1971. (300 copies) * ''From Canto Two of The Rats'', Wittersham, Kent: Alan Sillitoe, 1973 * ''Barbarians and Other Poems'', London: Turret Books, 1973. 500 copies * ''Storm: New Poems'', London: Allen, 1974 * ''Somme'', London: Steam Press, 1974. In Steam Press Portfolio, no. 2. 50 copies * ''Day-Dream Communiqué'', Knotting, Bedfordshire: Sceptre Press, 1977. 150 copies * ''From Snow on the North Side of Lucifer'', Knotting, Bedfordshire: Sceptre Press, 1979. (150 copies) * ''Snow on the North Side of Lucifer: Poems'', London: Allen, 1979 * ''Poems for Shakespeare 7'', Bear Gardens Museum and Arts Centre, 1979 (Limited to 500 numbered copies) * ''More Lucifer'', Knotting, Bedfordshire: Martin Booth, 1980. 125 copies * ''Sun Before Departure: Poems, 1974–1982'', London: Granada, 1984 * ''Tides and Stone Walls: Poems'', with photographs by Victor Bowley; London: Grafton, 1986 * ''Three Poems'', Child Okefurd, Dorset: Words Press, 1988. 200 copies * ''Collected Poems'', London: HarperCollins, 1993

Film scripts

* '' Saturday Night and Sunday Morning'' (1960) (screenplay based on own novel) * '' The Loneliness of the Long Distance Runner'' (1962) (screenplay based on own short story) * ''

Counterpoint In music theory, counterpoint is the relationship of two or more simultaneous musical lines (also called voices) that are harmonically dependent on each other, yet independent in rhythm and melodic contour. The term originates from the Latin ...

'' (1967) (based on his novel ''The General'') * '' The Ragman's Daughter'' (1972) (based on short story)

Translations

*''Chopin's Winter in Majorca 1838–1839'', by Luis Ripoll, translated by Sillitoe. Palma de Majorca: Mossen Alcover, 1955 *''Chopin’s Pianos: The Pleyel in Majorca,'' by Luis Ripoll, translated by Sillitoe. Palma de Majorca: Mossen Alcover, 1958 * ''All Citizens Are Soldiers (Fuente Ovejuna): A Play in Two Acts'', by

Lope de Vega Félix Lope de Vega y Carpio (; 25 November 156227 August 1635) was a Spanish playwright, poet, and novelist who was a key figure in the Spanish Golden Age (1492–1659) of Spanish Baroque literature, Baroque literature. In the literature of ...

, translated by Sillitoe and Ruth Fainlight. London: Macmillan, 1969; Chester Springs, PA: Dufour, 1969 * ''Poems for Shakespeare, volume 7'', edited and translated by Sillitoe and Ruth Fainlight. London: Bear Gardens Museum & Arts Centre, 1980

References

Sources

Reuters

External links

* * Ramsay Wood's 1971 interview 'Alan Sillitoe: The Image Shedding the Author', Four Quarters, La Salle University, Philadelphia, on Robert Twigger's blog 6 August 201
LeftLion interview with Alan SillitoeLeftLion obituary for Alan SillitoeThe start of Alan Sillitoe : How Sillitoe stood apart from the tradition of other Northern novelists going soft and successful in the South; Times online 1 October 2008Contemporary Writers: Alan Sillitoe

Guardian article, 2011

Alan Sillitoe describes his life as a smoker prior to the England smoking ban

* ttp://www.london-books.co.uk London Books
Sillitoe Trail iPhone App
James Walker and Paul Fillingham, Commissioned by Arts Council England and BBC. 28 October 2012. {{DEFAULTSORT:Sillitoe, Alan 1928 births 2010 deaths 20th-century English short story writers 20th-century English novelists 20th-century English poets English male poets Burials at Highgate Cemetery Deaths from cancer in England English male novelists English male short story writers English short story writers English socialists Fellows of the Royal Society of Literature Military personnel from Nottingham Royal Air Force personnel of the Malayan Emergency Writers from Nottingham