Sir Michael de Courcy Fraser Holroyd (born 27 August 1935) is an English biographer.

Early life and education

Holroyd was born in London, the son of Basil de Courcy Fraser Holroyd (a descendant of Sir George Sowley Holroyd, Justice of the King's Bench, whose ancestor was Isaac Holroyd, younger brother of George, the great-great-grandfather of John Baker Holroyd, 1st Earl of Sheffield), and his wife, Ulla (known as "Sue"), daughter of Karl Knutsson-Hall, a Swedish army officer. His parents having separated- their son "left to grow up in a bewilderingly extended family, shunted back and forth among parents and stepparents and grandparents and uncles and aunts"- Holroyd was raised at his father's family home, Norhurst, at

Maidenhead Maidenhead is a market town in the Royal Borough of Windsor and Maidenhead in the county of Berkshire, England. It lies on the southwestern bank of the River Thames, which at this point forms the border with Buckinghamshire. In the 2021 Census, ...

Berkshire Berkshire ( ; abbreviated ), officially the Royal County of Berkshire, is a Ceremonial counties of England, ceremonial county in South East England. It is bordered by Oxfordshire to the north, Buckinghamshire to the north-east, Greater London ...

. The Holroyds "for a time enjoyed a small fortune", provided by, amongst other things, an Indian tea plantation; this fortune was eventually "done in by mismanagement of resources and foolish investments" including investment in Lalique glassware, his grandfather having been its sole London agent in the 1920s. The Holroyd family had been "for several centuries" Yorkshire "butchers, clergymen, clothiers, farmers, landowners, soldiers, yeoman (sic) of all kinds". He was educated at

Eton College Eton College ( ) is a Public school (United Kingdom), public school providing boarding school, boarding education for boys aged 13–18, in the small town of Eton, Berkshire, Eton, in Berkshire, in the United Kingdom. It has educated Prime Mini ...

, though he has often claimed Maidenhead Public Library as his alma mater.

Career

In 1964, Holroyd published his first book, a biography of the writer Hugh Kingsmill; his reputation was consolidated in 1967–68 with the publication of his two-volume life of

Lytton Strachey Giles Lytton Strachey (; 1 March 1880 – 21 January 1932) was an English writer and critic. A founding member of the Bloomsbury Group and author of ''Eminent Victorians'', he established a new form of biography in which psychology, psychologic ...

(which the playwright Christopher Hampton later used extensively when writing the screenplay for the 1995 film '' Carrington''). Holroyd has also written biographies of Augustus John and, in four volumes, of Bernard Shaw. His book ''A Book of Secrets: Illegitimate Daughters, Absent Fathers'' (2010) concerns the Villa Cimbrone on the Gulf of Salerno and the Edwardian literary and society figures who lived there, such as Ernest Beckett, 2nd Baron Grimthorpe. '' Lytton Strachey: A Critical Biography'' (1967, 1968) became Holroyd's definitive work. He published a revised version in 1994 under the revised subtitle ''The New Biography''. Holroyd was chairman of the

Society of Authors The Society of Authors (SoA) is a United Kingdom trade union for professional writers, illustrators and literary translators, founded in 1884 to protect the rights and further the interests of authors. Membership of the society is open to "anyon ...

, 1973–83, and from 1985 to 1988 was president of the English branch of

PEN PEN may refer to: * (National Ecological Party), former name of the Brazilian political party Patriota (PATRI) * PEN International, a worldwide association of writers ** English PEN, the founding centre of PEN International ** PEN America, located ...

. He is also President of the Shaw Society. His awards include the 2001 Heywood Hill Literary Prize and the 2005 David Cohen Prize for literature. In 2006, he was awarded the Golden PEN Award by

English PEN Founded in 1921, English PEN is one of the world's first non-governmental organisations and among the first international bodies advocating for human rights. English PEN was the founding centre of PEN International, a worldwide writers' associa ...

for "a Lifetime's Distinguished Service to Literature". He was president 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 ...

from 2003 to 2008, and was knighted in the 2007 New Year Honours List. Holroyd is a patron of Dignity in Dying.

Personal life

Holroyd is married to the author Margaret Drabble.

Awards

*1968—'' Yorkshire Post'' Book Award (Book of the Year): ''Lytton Strachey: A Critical Biography'' *1988—Irish Life Arts Award *1989— CBE *1995—'' Prix du Meilleur Livre Etranger'' (France) *2001— Heywood Hill Literary Prize *2003— Golden PEN Award *2005— David Cohen British Literature Prize *2007— Knighted for services to

English Literature English literature is literature written in the English language from the English-speaking world. The English language has developed over more than 1,400 years. The earliest forms of English, a set of Anglo-Frisian languages, Anglo-Frisian d ...

*2008— James Tait Black Memorial Prize *2010—Lifetime Services to Biography Award

Bibliography

* * '' Lytton Strachey: A Critical Biography'', volume 1: ''The Unknown Years (1880-1910)'', Heinemann, 1967 * ''Lytton Strachey: A Critical Biography'', volume 2: ''The Years of Achievement (1910-1932)'', Heinemann, 1968 * ''A Dog's Life'', Henry Holt (US only), 1969 * ''The Best of Hugh Kingsmill: Selections from his Writings'' (editor), Gollancz, 1970 * ''Lytton Strachey by Himself: A Self-Portrait'' (editor), Heinemann, 1971 * ''Unreceived Opinions'', Heinemann, 1973 * ''Augustus John: A Biography'', volume 1: ''The Years of Innocence'', Heinemann, 1974 * ''The Art of Augustus John'' (with Malcolm Easton), Secker & Warburg, 1974 * ''Augustus John: A Biography'', volume 2: ''The Years of Experience'', Heinemann, 1975 * ''The Genius of Shaw: A Symposium'' (editor), Hodder & Stoughton, 1979 * ''The Shorter Strachey'' (editor with Paul Levy), Oxford University Press, 1980 * '' William Gerhardie: God's Fifth Column: A Biography of the Age: 1890-1940'' (editor with Robert Skidelsky), Hodder & Stoughton, 1981 * ''Essays by Divers Hands'', (editor), Boydell Press, 1982 * ''Peterley Harvest: The Private Diary of David Peterley'' (introduction), Secker & Warburg, 1985 * ''Bernard Shaw'', volume 1: ''1856-1898: The Search for Love'', Chatto & Windus, 1988 * ''Bernard Shaw'', volume 2: ''1898-1918: The Pursuit of Power'', Chatto & Windus, 1989 * ''Bernard Shaw'', volume 3: ''1918-1950: The Lure of Fantasy'', Chatto & Windus, 1991 * ''Bernard Shaw'', volume 4: ''1950-1991: The Last Laugh'', Chatto & Windus, 1992 * ''The Shaw Companion'', Chatto & Windus, 1992 * '' Lytton Strachey: The New Biography'', Chatto & Windus, 1994 * ''Augustus John: The New Biography'', Chatto & Windus, 1996 * ''Bernard Shaw'' (one-volume revised edition), Chatto & Windus, 1997 * ''Basil Street Blues: a Memoir'', Little, Brown, 1999 * ''The Whispering Gallery: Leaves from a Diplomat's Diary by Hesketh Pearson'', (introduction), Phoenix Press, 2000 * ''Works on Paper: The Craft of Biography and Autobiography'', Little, Brown, 2002 * ''Swedish Reflections: From Beowulf to Bergman'' (preface), Arcadia Books, 2003 * ''Mosaic. Portraits in Fragments'', Little, Brown, 2004 * ''A Strange Eventful History: The Dramatic Lives of Ellen Terry, Henry Irving and their Remarkable Families'', Chatto & Windus, 2008 * ''A Book of Secrets: Illegitimate Daughters, Absent Fathers'', Chatto & Windus, 2010 * ''On Wheels'', Chatto & Windus, 2012 * ''The Good Bohemian: The Letters of Ida John'' (editor with Rebecca John), Bloomsbury, 2017 * ''Ancestors in the Attic: My Great-Grandmother's Book of Ferns My Aunt's Book of Silent Actors'', Pimpernel Press, 2017 * ''Facts and Fiction: A Book of Storytelling'', Bloomsbury, 2018 ;Critical studies and reviews of Holroyd's work * Reviews ''A book of secrets''.

Notes

External links

* * *
"Portrait of a portrait painter"
an essay by Michael Holroyd about having his portrait painted fro
TLS
1 April 2009 {{DEFAULTSORT:Holroyd, Michael 1935 births Living people English biographers Writers from London 20th-century British male writers 20th-century British biographers Bloomsbury Group biographers People educated at Eton College People educated at Scaitcliffe School Knights Bachelor Commanders of the Order of the British Empire James Tait Black Memorial Prize recipients David Cohen Prize recipients Fellows of the Royal Historical Society Fellows of the Royal Society of Literature Presidents of the Royal Society of Literature Presidents of the English Centre of PEN