Sir Arthur Conan Doyle (1859 - 1930)

Born: 22 May 1859
Birthplace: Edinburgh, Scotland
Died: 7 July 1930 (heart attack)
Best Known As: The creator of Sherlock Holmes

Doyle, Sir Arthur Conan (1859-1930), British physician, novelist, and detective-story writer, creator of the unforgettable master sleuth Sherlock Holmes.

Conan Doyle was born on May 22, 1859, in Edinburgh and educated at Stonyhurst College and the University of Edinburgh. From 1882 to 1890 he practiced medicine in Southsea, England. A Study in Scarlet, the first of 60 stories featuring Sherlock Holmes, appeared in 1887. The characterization of Holmes, his ability of ingenious deductive reasoning, was based on one of the author's own university professors. Equally brilliant creations are those of Holmes's foils: his friend Dr. Watson, the good-natured if bumbling narrator of the stories, and the master criminal Professor Moriarty. Conan Doyle was so immediately successful in his literary career that approximately five years later he abandoned his medical practice to devote his entire time to writing.

Some of the best known of the Holmes stories are The Sign of the Four (1890), The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes (1892), The Hound of the Baskervilles (1902), and His Last Bow (1917). They made Conan Doyle internationally famous and served to popularize the detective-story genre (Detective Story; Mystery Story). A Holmes cult arose and still flourishes, notably through clubs of devotees such as the Baker Street Irregulars. Conan Doyle's literary versatility brought him almost equal fame for his historical romances such as Micah Clarke (1888), The White Company (1890), Rodney Stone (1896), and Sir Nigel (1906), and for his play A Story of Waterloo (1894).

Conan Doyle served in the Boer War as a physician, and on his return to England wrote The Great Boer War (1900) and The War in South Africa: Its Causes and Conduct (1902), justifying England's participation. For these works he was knighted in 1902. During World War I he wrote History of the British Campaign in France and Flanders (6 volumes, 1916-20) as a tribute to British bravery. An advocate of spiritualism since the late 1880s, his lectures and writings on the subject increased markedly after the death of his eldest son in the war. His autobiography, Memories and Adventures, was published in 1924. Conan Doyle died in Crowborough, Sussex, England, on July 7, 1930.


Sir Arthur Conan Doyle Books

The Mystery of Sasassa Valley 1879
J. Habakuk Jephson's Statement 1883
The Mystery of Cloomber 1889
The Captain of the Polestar 1890
The Firm of Girdlestone 1890
The Doings of Raffles Haw 1891
Beyond The City 1892
Round the Red Lamp 1894
The Parasite 1894
The Stark Munro Letters 1895
Rodney Stone 1896
A Duet 1899
The Great Boer War 1900
The Adventures of Gerard 1903
Through the Magic Door 1907
The New Revelation 1918
The Vital Message 1919
Tales of Terror and Mystery 1923
A Visit to Three Fronts 1916
The Exploits of Brigadier Gerard 1896
The Green Flag 1900
The Last Galley 1911
The Tragedy of The Korosko 1898
The History of Spiritualism Vol I 1926
The History of Spiritualism Vol II 1926

Poems

Songs of Action 1898
Songs of the Road 1911
The Guards Came Through 1919
The Poems of Arthur Conan Doyle. Collected edition 1922
Historical Novels

Micah Clarke 1889
The White Company 1891
The Great Shadow and Other Napoleonic Tales 1892
The Refugees 1893
Uncle Bernac 1896
Sir Nigel 1906

Professor Challenger Books

The Lost World 1912
The Poison Belt 1913
The Land of Mist 1926
The Disintegration Machine 1927
When the World Screamed 1928

Sherlock Holmes Detective Stories - Click Here to Read

Samuel Taylor Coleridge, (1772-1834)

Born: 21 October 1772

Birthplace: Devonshire, England

Died: 25 July 1834 (heart attack)

Best Known As: The author of The Rime of the Ancient Mariner

English poet, critic, and philosopher. Coleridge studied at the University of Cambridge, where he became closely associated with Robert Southey. In his poetry he perfected a sensuous lyricism that was echoed by many later poets. Lyrical Ballads (1798; with William Wordsworth), containing the famous "Rime of the Ancient Mariner" and "Frost at Midnight," heralded the beginning of English Romanticism. Other poems in the "fantastical" style of the "Mariner" include the unfinished "Christabel" and the celebrated "Pleasure Dome of Kubla Khan." While in a bad marriage and addicted to opium, he produced "Dejection: An Ode" (1802), in which he laments the loss of his power to produce poetry. Later, partly restored by his revived Anglican faith, he wrote Biographia Literaria, 2 vol. (1817), the most significant work of general literary criticism of the Romantic period. Imaginative and complex, with a unique intellect, Coleridge led a restless life full of turmoil and unfulfilled possibilities.

CLICK HERE To Download works by Samuel Taylor Coleridge

Agatha Christie, (1891-1976)

Born: 15 September 1890

Birthplace: Torquay, Devon, England

Died: 12 January 1976 (Natural causes)

Best Known As: Author of Murder on the Orient Express

Name at birth: Agatha May Clarissa Miller

Agatha Christie was born in 1890 in Torquay in England. Her father was called Frederick Miller so she was born as Agatha Mary Clarissa Miller. She was educated at home and studied singing and piano in Paris. In 1914 she married Archibald Christie, but then World War I had broken out. Agatha worked as a nurse in a Red Cross hospital in Torquay at that time and that experience was useful later on.

Her first book was published in 1920, The Mysterious Affair at Styles. There, readers met Hercules Poirot, the eccentric Belgian detective with the funny-looking moustache. But Agatha's books first attracted attention in 1926 when she published The Murder of Roger Ackroyd.

Agatha made news herself when she disappeared for a few days after her husband wanted a divorce. She was soon found to be staying in a hotel under an alias. Her disappearance is still a mystery! She and Archibald divorced in 1928 (he died in 1962). When she was around 40 years old she went on a holiday and visited e.g. Iraq where she met young archaeologist Max Mallowan, who was 14 years younger. They married in 1930 and Agatha Christie became Agatha Christie Mallowan. During World War II Agatha worked in the dispensary of University College Hospital in London. She often assisted her husband on excavations, e.g. in Iraq and Syria.

Agatha Christie wrote nearly seventy novels in her career and more than a hundred short stories. Her most famous characters are Hercules Poirot and Miss Marple, and the latter one was her personal favourite. She also wrote a few books about Tommy and Tuppence Beresford, and in some books there was no particular main character, e.g. in Ten Little Niggers. Agatha Christie also wrote six romantic novels under the name Mary Westmacott. Agatha's plays have also made her famous and her best known play, The Mousetrap, is most likely the best known mystery play in the world.

Agatha was the president of the Detection Club. She became Dame Agatha in 1971.

Agatha Christie died 12 January 1976, and two years later Max Mallowan died.

She is best known for her detective stories, largely centred around two detectives; the elderly Miss Marples and the pompous Poirot. Apart from her plots, today it is the period detail of her books that fascinates; the English village, the spa hotel, the country house and the cruise-ship. She chronicles a vanished pre- WW2 upper middle class Britain which enhances the staginess of her characters and plots.

Click here to download books written By Agatha Christie

Winston Churchill (1874 - 1965)

Born: 30 November 1874

Birthplace: Blenheim Palace, Oxfordshire, England

Died: 24 January 1965

Best Known As: Indefatigable prime minister of Britain during World War II

Soldier, politician and finally prime minister, Winston Churchill was one of Britain's greatest 20th-century heroes. He is particularly remembered for his indomitable spirit while leading Great Britain to victory in World War II. Churchill fought with the British Army in India and Sudan, and as a journalist was captured in South Africa (where his dispatches from the Boer War first brought him to public prominence). He became a member of Parliament in 1900 and remained an MP for over 64 years. His early topsy-turvy political career earned him many enemies, but his stirring speeches, bulldog tenacity and refusal to make peace with Adolf Hitler made him the popular choice to lead England through World War II. When Britain and its allies prevailed in 1945, Churchill's place in history was assured. (Ironically, he lost the prime ministership two months after Germany's surrender, when the opposition Labor Party took majority control of Parliament.) One of the 20th century's most quotable wits, Churchill wrote a plethora of histories, biographies and memoirs, including the landmark four-volume A History of the English-speaking Peoples (1956-58). In 1953 he was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature; he was knighted the same year.

Churchill served as prime minister from 1940-45 and again from 1951-55... His wartime contemporaries included presidents Franklin Roosevelt and Harry Truman, French resistance leader Charles de Gaulle and Soviet leader Joseph Stalin... More recent British PMs have included Margaret Thatcher and Tony Blair... The famous portrait of a scowling Churchill was taken by Canadian photographer Yousuf Karsh.

Click Here to Download Books written by Winston Churchill

Click Here to purchase books written by Winston Churchill

William Wordsworth (1770 - 1850)

Born: 7 April 1770

Birthplace: Cockermouth, England

Died: 23 April 1850

Best Known As: The author of the poem "Tintern Abbey"

One of the great English poets, he was a leader of the romantic movement in England.In 1791 he graduated from Cambridge and traveled abroad. While in France he fell in love with Annette Vallon, who bore him a daughter, Caroline, in 1792. Although he did not marry her, it seems to have been circumstance rather than lack of affection that separated them. Throughout his life he supported Annette and Caroline as best he could, finally settling a sum of money on them in 1835.

The spirit of the French Revolution had strongly influenced Wordsworth, and he returned (1792) to England imbued with the principles of Rousseau and republicanism. In 1793 were published An Evening Walk and Descriptive Sketches, written in the stylized idiom and vocabulary of the 18th cent. The outbreak of the Reign of Terror prevented Wordsworth's return to France, and after receiving several small legacies, he settled with his sister Dorothy in Dorsetshire. Wordsworth was extraordinarily close to his sister. Throughout his life she was his constant and devoted companion, sharing his poetic vision and helping him with his work.

In Dorsetshire Wordsworth became the intimate friend of Samuel Taylor Coleridge and, probably under his influence, a student of David Hartley's empiricist philosophy. Together the two poets wrote Lyrical Ballads (1798), in which they sought to use the language of ordinary people in poetry; it included Wordsworth's poem “Tintern Abbey.” The work introduced romanticism into England and became a manifesto for romantic poets. In 1799 he and his sister moved to the Lake District of England, where they lived the remainder of their lives. A second edition of the Lyrical Ballads (1800), which included a critical essay outlining Wordsworth's poetic principles, in particular his ideas about poetic diction and meter, was unmercifully attacked by critics.

In 1802 Wordsworth married Mary Hutchinson, an old school friend; the union was evidently a happy one, and the couple had four children. The Prelude, his long autobiographical poem, was completed in 1805, though it was not published until after his death. His next collection, Poems in Two Volumes (1807), included the well-known “Ode to Duty,” the “Ode: Intimations of Immortality,” and a number of famous sonnets.

Thereafter, Wordsworth's creative powers diminished. Nonetheless, some notable poems were produced after this date, including The Excursion (1814), “Laodamia” (1815), “White Doe of Rylstone” (1815), Memorials of a Tour of the Continent, 1820 (1822), and “Yarrow Revisited” (1835). In 1842 Wordsworth was given a civil list pension, and the following year, having long since put aside radical sympathies, he was named poet laureate.

Click Here to download works by William Wordsworth

Ann Radcliffe (1764 - 1823)

Born July 9, 1764, London, Eng. — died Feb. 7, 1823, London) English gothic novelist. Brought up in a well-to-do family, in 1787 she married a journalist who encouraged her literary pursuits. Her first two novels were published anonymously. She achieved fame with her third novel, The Romance of the Forest (1791). With her fourth, The Mysteries of Udolpho (1794), she became the most popular novelist in England. The Italian (1797), which displays rare psychological insight, reveals her full powers. In her tales, scenes of terror and suspense are infused with an aura of romantic sensibility

Publications include

* The Castles of Athlin and Dunbayne (1 volume), 1789, gothic novel.
* A Sicilian Romance (2 vols.) 1790, gothic novel.
* The Romance of the Forest (3 vols.) 1791, gothic novel.
* The Mysteries of Udolpho (4 vols.) 1794.
* The Italian (3 vols.) 1797
* Gaston de Blondeville (4 vols.) 1826, reprinted in 2006 by Valancourt Books

Click Here to download books written by Ann Radcliffe

T. S. Eliot (1888 - 1965)

Born: 26 September 1888

Birthplace: St. Louis, Missouri

Died: 4 January 1965

Best Known As: Author of The Waste Land

Name at birth: Thomas Stearns Eliot

Eliot's "The Waste Land" is the most famous English poem of the 20th century, a landmark meditation on human unease with the modern world. Born in America, Eliot moved to England in 1914, working as a bank clerk while writing his first collection of poetry, Prufrock and Other Observations (1917, featuring "The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock"). He followed that success with The Waste Land (1922), Ash Wednesday (1930) and Four Quartets (1943), among other collections and essays. A highly regarded critic, Eliot was the founder (1922) and longtime editor of the literary magazine Criterion. His plays include Murder in the Cathedral (1935) and The Cocktail Party (1949). Eliot became a British subject and member of the Church of England in 1927. His whimsical volume of children's verse, Old Possum's Book of Practical Cats (1939), was adapted into the long-running hit musical Cats.

He won the Nobel Prize for literature in 1948... Eliot was close friends with poet Ezra Pound... Eliot was married twice, to Vivienne Haigh-Wood (1915) and to his former secretary Valerie Fletcher (1957)... He studied at prestigious universities in three countries: Harvard in the U.S., the Sorbonne in France, and Oxford in England... Eliot is unrelated to the author George Eliot... "The Waste Land" begins with the famous line "April is the cruellest month"... His poem "The Hollow Men" ends with the lines "This is the way the world ends / Not with a bang but a whimper."

To download works by T. S. Eliot - CLICK HERE

Lewis Carroll (1832-1898)

Born: 27 January 1832

Birthplace: Daresbury, Cheshire, England

Died: 14 January 1898 (Influenza)

Best Known As: Author of Alice's Adventures in Wonderland

Name at birth: Charles Lutwidge Dodgson

pseud. of Charles Lutwidge Dodgson, 1832–98, English writer, mathematician, and amateur photographer, b. near Daresbury, Cheshire (now in Halton). Educated at Christ Church College, Oxford, he was nominated to a studentship (life fellowship) in 1852, and he remained at Oxford for the rest of his life. Although his fellowship was clerical, Carroll never proceeded higher than his ordination as a deacon in 1861. Shy and afflicted with a stammer, he felt himself unsuited to the demanding life of a minister. He did, however, lecture in mathematics at Christ Church from 1855 until 1881. Among his mathematical works, now almost forgotten, is Euclid and His Modern Rivals (1879).

Carroll is chiefly remembered as the author of the famous children's books Alice's Adventures in Wonderland (1865) and its sequel, Through the Looking Glass (1872), both published under his pseudonym and both illustrated by Sir John Tenniel. He developed these stories from tales he told to the children of H. G. Liddell, the dean of Christ Church College, one of whom was named Alice. Many of his characters—the Mad Hatter, the March Hare, the White Rabbit, the Red Queen, and the White Queen—have become familiar figures in literature and conversation. Although numerous satiric and symbolic meanings have been read into Alice's adventures, the works can be read and valued as simple exercises in fantasy. Carroll himself said that in the books he meant only nonsense. He also wrote humorous verses, the most popular of them being The Hunting of the Snark (1876). His later stories for children, Sylvie and Bruno (1889) and Sylvie and Bruno Concluded (1893), though containing interesting experiments in construction, are widely regarded as failures.

Carroll remained a bachelor all his life. Partly because of his stammer he found association with adults difficult and was most at ease in the company of children, especially little girls, with whom he was clearly obsessed. Early in 1856 he took up photography as a hobby; his photographs of children are still considered remarkable.
Download Books written By Lewis Carroll - Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland - Click Here

Anthony Malcolm Buckeridge (1912 - 2004)

Anthony Malcolm Buckeridge OBE (June 20, 1912 - June 28, 2004) was an English author, best known for his Jennings and Rex Milligan series of children's books, although he also wrote the 1953 children's book A Funny Thing Happened which was serialised more than once on Children's Hour.

Buckeridge was born in London but following the death of his banker father in the First World War he moved with his mother to Ross-on-Wye to live with his grandparents. Following the end of the war they returned to London where the young Buckeridge developed a taste for theatre and writing. A scholarship from the Bank Clerks' Orphanage fund permitted his mother to send him to Seaford College boarding school in Sussex. His experiences as a schoolboy there were instrumental in his later work.

Following the death of Buckeridge's grandfather, the family moved to Welwyn Garden City where his mother worked in promoting the new suburban utopia to Londoners. In 1930 Buckeridge began work at his late father's bank but soon tired of it. Instead he took to acting including an uncredited part in Anthony Asquith's 1931 film Tell England.

After marrying his first wife, Sylvia Brown, he enrolled at University College London where he involved himself in Socialist and anti-war groups (he later became an active member of CND) but did not take a degree after failing Latin. With a young family to support, Buckeridge found himself teaching in Suffolk and Northamptonshire which provided further experiences to inform his later work. During the Second World War, Buckeridge was called up as a fireman and wrote several plays for the stage before returning to teaching in Ramsgate.

He used to tell his pupils stories about the fictional Jennings (based however on an old schoolfellow Diarmid Jennings), a prep schoolboy boarding at Linbury Court Preparatory School, headmaster Mr Pemberton-Oakes.

After World War II, Buckeridge wrote a series of radio plays for the BBC's Children's Hour chronicling the exploits of Jennings and his rather more staid friend, Darbishire; the first, Jennings Learns the Ropes, was first broadcast on October 16,1948. In 1950, the first of more than twenty novels, Jennings goes to School, appeared. The tales make liberal use of Buckeridge's inventive schoolboy slang ("fossilised fish hooks!", "crystallised cheesecakes!", and others). These books, as well known as Frank Richards' Billy Bunter books in their day, were translated into a number of other languages. The stories of middle class English schoolboys were especially popular in Norway where several were filmed. However the Norwegian books and films were rewritten completely for a Norwegian setting with Norwegian names so "Jennings" is an unknown name in Norway. Most Norwegians are, however, familiar with "Stompa", as Jennings is called in the Norwegian books, and often assume that the books were originally written in Norwegian.

In 1962 he met his second wife, Eileen Selby, whom he felt was the true love of his life. They settled near Lewes where Buckeridge continued to write and also appeared in small (non-singing) roles at Glyndebourne.

Buckeridge made no small contribution to postwar British humour, a fact acknowledged by such comedians as Stephen Fry. The deftly worded farce and delightful understatement of his narratives has been compared to the work of P. G. Wodehouse, Ben Hecht and Ben Travers.

Buckeridge wrote an autobiography, While I Remember (ISBN 0-9521482-1-8). He was awarded the OBE in 2003.

Buckeridge died on June 28, 2004 after a spell of ill health. He is survived by his second wife Eileen and three children, two from his first marriage.


Works By Anthony Malcolm Buckeridge

* Jennings Goes to School (1950)
* Jennings Follows a Clue (1951)
* Jennings' Little Hut (1951)
* Jennings and Darbishire (1952)
* Jennings' Diary (1953)
* According to Jennings (1954)
* Our Friend Jennings (1955)
* Thanks to Jennings (1957)
* Take Jennings, for Instance (1958)
* Jennings, as Usual (1959)
* The Trouble With Jennings (1960)
* Just Like Jennings (1961)
* Leave it to Jennings (1963)
* Jennings, Of Course! (1964)
* Especially Jennings! (1965)
* Jennings Abounding (1967) (this was later reissued as Jennings Unlimited to avoid confusion with Samuels French's stage play of the same name)
* Jennings in Particular (1968)
* Trust Jennings! (1969)
* The Jennings Report (1970)
* Typically Jennings! (1971)
* Speaking of Jennings! (1973)
* Jennings at Large (1977)
* Jennings Again! (1991)
* That's Jennings (1994)

Download Anthony Malcolm Buckeridge's works click here

Douglas Adams (1952-2001)

Born: 11 March 1952

Birthplace: Cambridge, England

Died: 11 May 2001 (heart attack)

Best Known As: Author of The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy

Career Highlights: The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, Monty Python's Flying Circus: Party Political Broadcast, The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy

First Major Screen Credit: Monty Python's Flying Circus: Party Political Broadcast (1974)

Douglas Adams was the creator of the The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, a whimsical science fiction novel published in 1979. The Hitchhiker's Guide was originally a BBC radio program first broadcast in 1978; later the book and its sequels became cult favorites with college students and sci-fi fans around the world. The book's popular characters included Arthur Dent, Ford Prefect and Zaphod Beeblebrox; sequels included Restaurant at the End of the Universe (1980) and So Long, and Thanks For All the Fish (1984). Adams also wrote Dirk Gently's Holistic Detective Agency (1987). Adams died in 2001 after suffering a heart attack at a gym in Santa Monica, California.

Because Adams's middle name was Noel, he is often referred to as "DNA" by fans.

Click Here to down Load books written by Douglas Adams