Leonard Merrick

Leonard Merrick (21 February 1864 – 7 August 1939) was an English novelist. Although largely forgotten today, he was widely admired by his peers; J. M. Barrie called Merrick the "novelist's novelist."

Life and work

He was born as Leonard Miller in Belsize Park, London of Jewish parentage.John Sutherland "MERRICK, Leonard", in ''Companion to Victorian Fiction'', London and Stanford: Longman & Stanford UP, 1989
p.430-31
/ref> After schooling at Brighton College, he studied to be a solicitor in Brighton and studied law at Heidelberg, but he was forced to travel to South Africa at the age of eighteen after his father suffered a serious financial loss. There he worked as an overseer in the Kimberley diamond mine and in a solicitor's office.John Matthews Manly, Edith Rickert. ''Contemporary British literature: bibliographies and study outlines''
pg.117
After surviving a near-fatal case of "camp fever," he returned to London in the late 1880s and worked as an actor and actor-manager under the stage name of Leonard Merrick."LEONARD MERRICK COMES INTO HIS OWN"
By Frederick Taber Cooper, '' Publishers Weekly'', Volume 96, 1920. He legally changed his name to Leonard Merrick in 1892. He later worked his experiences in South Africa and in the theatre into numerous works of fiction. Merrick's novels include ''Mr Bazalgette's Agent'' (1888), a detective story; ''Violet Moses'' (1891), about a Jewish financier and his troubled wife; ''The Worldlings'' (1900), a psychological investigation of a crime; ''Conrad in Quest of His Youth'' (1903), the tale of a disillusioned man who, at thirty-seven, sets out to pick up the romantic threads of his younger life, which is "judged his most successful work" according to John Sutherland. George Orwell thought that this is because it is one of the few of his books which is not set against a background of poverty.

Merrick was well regarded by other writers of his era. In 1918 fifteen writers, including famous authors such as H. G. Wells, J. M. Barrie, G. K. Chesterton and William Dean Howells, collaborated with publisher E. P. Dutton to issue ''The Works of Leonard Merrick'' in fifteen volumes, which were published between 1918 and 1922. Each volume in the series was selected and prefaced by one of the writers."One Man's View"
from ''Neglected Books'', 19 July 2010 In 2009 a biography was issued titled ''Leonard Merrick: A Forgotten Novelist's Novelist'' by William Baker and Jeannettes Robert Shumaker.William Baker and Jeannettes Robert Shumaker ''Leonard Merrick: A Forgotten Novelist's Novelist'' (2009) The title is taken in part from a quote by J. M. Barrie who called Merrick a "novelist's novelist." William Dean Howells wrote of Merrick "I can think of no recent fictionist of his nation who can quite match with Mr. Merrick in that excellence f "shapeliness" or form in the novel This will seem great praise, possibly too great, to the few who have a sense of such excellence; but it will probably be without real meaning to most, though our public might well enjoy form if it could once be made to imagine it."

George Orwell, while describing Merrick as a "good bad writer", rather than a strictly good writer, admitted to a great admiration for his work; he particularly praised ''Cynthia'' (which was also a favourite of Chesterton's), the story of a struggling writer and his wife, and ''The Position of Peggy Harper'', with its portrayal of the unromantic side of provincial theatre. In Orwell's view, nobody conveyed better than Merrick how dreary and dispiriting an actor's life can be. Graham Greene, another admirer, had recruited Orwell to write an introduction to any work by Merrick while Greene was publisher for Eyre & Spottiswoode in 1944. Orwell offered to write one for ''The Position of Peggy Harper'', but it wasn't meant to be.

At least eleven of Merrick's stories have been adapted to screen, most in the 1920s, including ''Conrad in Quest of His Youth'' (1920) directed by William C. deMille. Later adaptions include a 1931 film ''The Magnificent Lie'' based on the story "Laurels and the Lady", and a 1952 TV episode called "Masquerade" for '' Lux Video Theatre'' based on the story "The Doll in the Pink Silk Dress".

Merrick died at the age of 75, in a London nursing home on 7 August 1939.''The Publishers Weekly'', Volume 136, Issue 1
pg. 462

Works

Novels

*''Mr Bazalgette's Agent'' (1888)
*''Violet Moses'' (1891)
*''The Man Who Was Good'' (1892)
*''Cynthia'' (1896)
*''One Man's View'' (1897)
*''The Actor-Manager'' (1898)
*''The Worldlings'' (1900)
*''Conrad in Quest of His Youth'' (1903)
*''The Quaint Companions'' (1903)
*''The House of Lynch'' (1907)
*''The Position of Peggy Harper'' (1911)
*''When Love Flies Out the Window'' (1914)

Short story collections

*''This Stage of Fools'' (1896)
*''Whispers About Women'' (1906)
*''The Man Who Understood Women'' (1908)
*''While Paris Laughed'' (1918)
*''A Chair on the Boulevard'' (1919)
*''To Tell You the Truth'' (1922)
*''The Call from the Past and Other Stories'' (1924)
*''Four Stories'' (1927)
*''The Little Dog Laughed'' (1930)

Plays

*''The Free Pardon'' ''written with F. C. Philips''
*''When the Lamps are Lighted''
*''My Innocent Boy''
*''The Elixir of Youth''
*''A Woman in the Case'' ''written with George R. Sims''

Filmography

*', directed by George Abbott and Dell Henderson (1918, based on the play ''The Imposter'')
*''The Worldlings'', directed by Eric Harrison (UK, 1920, based on the novel ''The Worldlings'')
*'' Conrad in Quest of His Youth'', directed by William C. deMille (1920, based on the novel ''Conrad in Quest of His Youth'')
*'' Fool's Paradise'', directed by Cecil B. DeMille (1921, based on the story ''Laurels and the Lady'')
*'' A Daughter of Luxury'', directed by Paul Powell (1922, based on the play ''The Imposter'')
*''The Darling of the Rich'', directed by John G. Adolfi (1922, based on the play ''The Imposter'')
*'' A Thief in Paradise'', directed by George Fitzmaurice (1925, based on the novel ''The Worldlings'')
*''School for Wives'', directed by Victor Halperin (1925, based on the novel ''The House of Lynch'')
*''The Magnificent Lie'', directed by Berthold Viertel (1931, based on the story ''Laurels and the Lady'')

Notes

External links

*
*
*
*
*'' Life'' magazine .

{{DEFAULTSORT:Merrick, Leonard
1864 births
1939 deaths
19th-century English novelists
20th-century English novelists
19th-century British short story writers
20th-century British short story writers
English Jewish writers
Jewish novelists
Writers from London
People educated at Brighton College
English male novelists
19th-century English male writers
20th-century English male writers