Which famous authors had affairs / friendships with other authors?

Status
Not open for further replies.

TrixieLox

Benefactor Member
Kind Benefactor
Super Member
Registered
Joined
Jan 26, 2009
Messages
593
Reaction score
83
Location
Just outside London
I'm always asking these weird questions and saying it's for a project I'm working on / article I'm writing, but really, it is!

I'm trying to draw connections between British authors of the 20th century and am really struggling to find the dirt - who had affairs with whom? Who hated whom? Also, the niver stuff: who was friends with whom? Sure, there were lots of affairs but intercontinental - but that's no darn good! And of course, Virginia Woolf had a lot of dalliances but who else?

Would really appreciate some help on this! I'm talking 1900-2000 and British...

Thanks! Trix
 

waylander

Who's going for a beer?
Super Member
Registered
Joined
Oct 24, 2005
Messages
8,276
Reaction score
1,566
Age
65
Location
London, UK
Who didn't HG Wells have affairs with?
 

shaldna

The cake is a lie. But still cake.
Super Member
Registered
Joined
May 12, 2009
Messages
7,485
Reaction score
897
Location
Belfast
not british, but maeve binchy is married to gordon snell
 

willietheshakes

Gentleman. Scholar. Bastard.
Super Member
Registered
Joined
Feb 18, 2005
Messages
3,661
Reaction score
726
Location
Semi-sunny Victoria BC
Google Salman Rushdie and Martin Amis - bad blood there.
VS Naipaul and Paul Theroux (also bad blood)
Hitchens, MacEwan and Amis were all friends.
 

Gretad08

Super Member
Registered
Joined
Feb 19, 2009
Messages
2,842
Reaction score
494
Location
A really cool place
Bram Stoker and Oscar Wilde were acquaintances who ended up vying for the affection of the same girl. Stoker won and ended up marrying her, which didn't make Wilde very happy, but they eventually resumed the friendship/acquaintanceship.

They're both Irish BTW.
 

CaroGirl

Living the dream
Super Member
Registered
Joined
Feb 27, 2006
Messages
8,368
Reaction score
2,327
Location
Bookstores
C.S. Lewis and J.R.R. Tolkien were good friends since they first met at Oxford and belonged to the Inklings group together. But they hated one another’s books. When Tolkien was writing a new character for Lord of the Rings and tried to describe the character to Lewis, Lewis famously responded, “Not another fucking dwarf!”
 

Paul

Banned
Joined
Sep 17, 2009
Messages
4,502
Reaction score
482
Location
Close to mother Sea
Sylvia Platt & Ted Hughes was pretty big.

Sam Beckett with Joyce's daughter (British subjects at the time, but very Irish)
Beckett & Joyce had a strong friendship
 
Last edited:

Rhoda Nightingale

Vampire Junkie
Super Member
Registered
Joined
Sep 25, 2009
Messages
4,470
Reaction score
658
Bram Stoker and Oscar Wilde were acquaintances who ended up vying for the affection of the same girl. Stoker won and ended up marrying her, which didn't make Wilde very happy, but they eventually resumed the friendship/acquaintanceship.

They're both Irish BTW.
I thought Oscar Wilde was gay?
 

eyeblink

Barbara says hi
Super Member
Registered
Joined
Nov 14, 2007
Messages
6,358
Reaction score
892
Location
Aldershot, UK
There's the crowd of mostly left-wing writers from the 1930s - Auden, Isherwood, Stephen Spender...and Edward Upward, the last of them to pass away, last year at the age of 105.

Don't forget the Bloomsbury crowd (Virginia Woolf, Vita Sackville-West etc).

ETA: Inklings already mentioned.
 
Last edited:

Gretad08

Super Member
Registered
Joined
Feb 19, 2009
Messages
2,842
Reaction score
494
Location
A really cool place
I thought Oscar Wilde was gay?


I believe Paul's right, he was bi-sexual. He married and had children. Read the section titled "Lyceum Theatre..." under the Wikipedia link. I just read this information in the foreword of B&N Classic Dracula too.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bram_Stoker

Also, Stoker lived until 1912, Wilde died in 1900, so technically they both made it into the 20th century.
 

TrixieLox

Benefactor Member
Kind Benefactor
Super Member
Registered
Joined
Jan 26, 2009
Messages
593
Reaction score
83
Location
Just outside London
This is great, thanks guys! I am working on a nightmare project at work (in terms of logistics) but a dream subject-matter! Making me wanna go back and read all those 20 C Brit-lit classics now... been spending far too much time reading YA lately.
 

milly

seeing sparks
Super Member
Registered
Joined
Mar 12, 2010
Messages
8,443
Reaction score
2,818
Anais Nin with Henry Miller...twentieth century at least
 

Witch_turtle

hanging around for a spell
Super Member
Registered
Joined
Feb 14, 2009
Messages
910
Reaction score
113
Location
North
Do songwriters/singers count?? Cause Neil Gaiman and Tori Amos are friends with a bunch of really interesting intertextuality between their works . . . I believe she's a tree in Stardust and he's mentioned in a bunch of her songs. *shrug* that's the only one I know off the top of my head :p
 

Irissel

Wandering Aimlessly Through Life
Super Member
Registered
Joined
Jun 21, 2010
Messages
68
Reaction score
8
Location
Florida
Website
irissel.blogspot.com
C.S. Lewis and J.R.R. Tolkien were good friends since they first met at Oxford and belonged to the Inklings group together. But they hated one another’s books. When Tolkien was writing a new character for Lord of the Rings and tried to describe the character to Lewis, Lewis famously responded, “Not another fucking dwarf!”

Actually, C. S. Lewis loved Tolkien's work. I believe that member of the Inklings who made that disparaging comment about dwarves was Hugo Dyson. J. R. R. Tolkien didn't think to highly of Lewis' Narnia books, however. I think their friendship started going sour when Lewis married a divorce, which Tolkien didn't agree with...
 

Don Allen

Seeking a Sanctuary of Intelligence
Super Member
Registered
Joined
Jun 5, 2007
Messages
3,573
Reaction score
845
Location
Gilman, Illinois
Hemingway srewed the blond reporter, then married her.,,, forget her name off the top of my head. Also had a spot in the Cuban brothels if I remember correctly while very married.
 

JeanneTGC

I *am* Catwoman...and Gini Koch
Super Member
Registered
Joined
Oct 23, 2006
Messages
7,676
Reaction score
5,784
Location
A Little South of Sanity
Website
www.ginikoch.com
Robert Benchley and Dorothy Parker were very close...never crossed the line, but undoubtedly considered it. All the members of the Algonquin Round Table were interconnected, and I think a lot of them went back and forth from the U.S. to the U.K. And they all knew Hemingway, Benchley in particular was friends with him.
 

Priene

Out to lunch
Super Member
Registered
Joined
Aug 25, 2007
Messages
6,422
Reaction score
879
Jean Rhys and Ford Madox Ford. My mind boggles when I think about that one.
 
Status
Not open for further replies.