Biographies: Alan Sillitoe - Writer

Biographies

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English writer, born in Nottingham, United Kingdom. He became famous during the 1950s as one of a group of novelists and playwrights who called themselves "angry young men," but the group broke up after only two years. He joined the British Royal Air Force four years later. He contracted pneumonia while serving in the Air Force, forcing him to spend sixteen months in the hospital, where he began writing his first novels. After he visited France and Mallorca, Spain, he wrote his novel, Saturday Night and Sunday Morning, which he convinced a publishing house to publish in 1958. The novel was adapted into a cinematic work in 1960. His novel, The Loneliness of the Long Distance, won the Hawthornden Prize in 1959 and was also adapted into a film in 1962.  In addition to many novels, he published collections of poetry and children's stories and also wrote a number of plays. He married the American poet Ruth Fainlight, and they had a son and an adopted daughter. He died in London, United Kingdom.

• 6 March 2024
• Salma El-Sharkawy