author
Alec Waugh
1898–1981
Best known for candid school stories, wide-ranging travel books, and the novel that became the film Island in the Sun, this prolific British writer built a career that lasted more than sixty years. His work often mixed sharp social observation with a restless curiosity about places, people, and changing ways of life.
6 Audiobooks
The Loom of Youth
by Alec Waugh
The Lonely Unicorn: A Novel
by Alec Waugh
Public School Life: Boys, Parents, Masters
by Alec Waugh
The Prisoners of Mainz
by Alec Waugh
Roland Whately: A Novel
by Alec Waugh
Myself When Young: Confessions
by Alec Waugh
About the author
Born in London on July 8, 1898, Alec Waugh was the eldest son of author and publisher Arthur Waugh and the older brother of Evelyn Waugh. He was educated at Sherborne School, where his experiences inspired his early novel The Loom of Youth (1917), a book that caused a stir for its frank picture of public-school life.
Waugh served in the British Army during the First World War and was wounded in action. He went on to become a remarkably productive novelist, biographer, and travel writer, publishing more than fifty books across his career. Among his best-known works is Island in the Sun (1955), which was later adapted into a major film.
His writing ranged far beyond fiction, reflecting a long interest in travel, society, and literary life. He continued publishing into the 1970s, and his long career gives readers a broad picture of 20th-century tastes and concerns, from school and war to empire, class, and the changing social world.