| FW_2 Posted on 28/9 15:06 | |
| What have you learnt today? | |
I have just been sent this hitherto unbeknownst to me information: ERNEST WILLIAM HORNUNG (1866 - 1921) The creator of the famous Raffles was born at Eardley Villa, Grove Hill, Middlesbrough, though house and road have now disappeared under the Grove Hill estate. His father was a coal exporter and also served as Swedish, Norwegian and Danish vice consul. His premises were in Turton street (also gone). Young Hornung was sent to Uppingham public school, after which he joined the family business. He then spent two years in Australia (1884-86) for health reasons. That country forms the background for several of his later works; we recall that Raffles began his career of crime in Australia. Hornung then worked as a journalist in London and married Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's sister, Connie, in 1893. Doyle wrote of him: 'I like young Willie Hornung very much. He is one of the sweetest-natured and most delicate-minded men I ever knew'. As if to show Sherlock Holmes on the wrong side of the law, Hornung invented the gentleman-thief A.J. Raffles, whose exploits are recounted by his faithful friend Bunny. Conan Doyle disapproved of casting a criminal in the role of hero, while Hornung, for his part, made flattering puns - 'though he might be more humble, there's no police like Holmes'. Hornung dedicated the first raffles book The Amateur Cracksman (1899) to Conan Doyle, and may even have borrowed his anti-hero's name from an obscure Doyle story 'The Doings of Raffles Haw'. The stories are exciting, atmospheric and above all, wonderfully unpredictable. Though there are occasional references to public school life and Australia, Hornung's Teesside childhood is not mentioned directly. However, among Raffle's accomplishments is a command of three Yorkshire dialects, and the North East reader will spot that among his victims are Lady Kirkleatham and Lord Thornaby. Hornung was greatly saddened by the death of his only son at Ypres and in 1917 published two poems in The Times - 'Bond and Free' and 'Wooden Crosses' which aroused wide interest. He was in France when the great German offensive of 1918 began, and he wrote a vivid description of the bombardment of Arras in his last book Notes of a Camp Follower on the Western Front (1919). After the war, he retired with failing health to southern France, where he died of pneumonia. A play based on Raffles ran for two years in London, and the character has been played on screen by Ronald Colman and David Niven, among others. George Orwell regarded both the Sherlock Holmes and Raffles stories as enjoyable examples of the 'good bad book', which would survive when more earnest authors had been forgotten. Orwell considered Hornung a very able writer on that level and one of his most celebrated essays is entitled 'Raffles and Miss Blandish'. | |
| eugene_schlumberger Posted on 28/9 16:04 | |
| re: What have you learnt today? | |
Having returned to the board after a hiatus lasting several hours (P.E and Science lessons) I find it hard to belive that this super thread was languishing so far down the board without a response. Shame on you all. | |
| towz Posted on 28/9 16:07 | |
| re: What have you learnt today? | |
I'm sure I've heard this before but interesting none the less. I've never read any of he's book like. Are they any good? | |
| Stuar_Tripley Posted on 28/9 16:09 | |
| re: What have you learnt today? | |
I have learnt the following.... there have been 51 British PMs.... the 1st wast Robert Walpole in the 18th century and a psephologist is someone who studies election results (as in John Snow and his swingometer). | |
| Jonny_ov_boro Posted on 28/9 16:09 | |
| re: What have you learnt today? | |
Never to use this meaasgeboard from the college network, I nearly got banned from the network meaning all my coursework would be lost to kilobyte heaven | |
| blotonthelandscape Posted on 28/9 16:12 | |
| re: What have you learnt today? | |
I wonder if it was close to where Cloughy was born. | |
| redz69 Posted on 28/9 16:15 | |
| re: What have you learnt today? | |
Ive got one of his books that came as a freebie from an old lady in London, in a box of carboot stuff. I have started to read it and its very propa. I have to read it slow, although not as hard as Shakespeare to read its still got a lot of dead hard words in every sentence. I have found that if I wear pyjamas and a silk dressing gown whilst sipping a vodka and cranberry juice, then its easier to read. My copy of a Thief in the Night is a 1956 edition of a book first published in 1905. | |
| The_Lizards_Jumpers Posted on 28/9 16:17 | |
| re: What have you learnt today? | |
Let's start a fund for a statue, after all he probably did as much for Middlesbrough as Brian Clough and everyone wants a statue of him. | |
| redz69 Posted on 28/9 16:18 | |
| re: What have you learnt today? | |
I also know there is a chapter that I have not reached yet which has a character called Lord Thornaby. | |
| redz69 Posted on 28/9 16:20 | |
| re: What have you learnt today? | |
random fact, he died of a broken heart some years after the death of his son at Ypres. | |
| redz69 Posted on 28/9 16:26 | |
| re: What have you learnt today? | |
sorry, today I learned that it is easier to plank over a ceiling rather than plaster it. | |
