author
Elizabeth Bowen
1899–1973
An acclaimed Anglo-Irish novelist and short-story writer, Elizabeth Bowen explored the hidden tensions beneath respectable lives—from the fading world of the Irish “Big House” to the uncertainty of wartime London. Her atmospheric fiction remains celebrated for its psychological insight and elegant, modern style.
2 Audiobooks
The Hotel
by Elizabeth Bowen
The last September
by Elizabeth Bowen
About the author
Elizabeth Bowen (1899–1973) was born in Dublin and spent her childhood between Ireland and England. Raised in an Anglo-Irish family connected to Bowen’s Court in County Cork, she began publishing with the short-story collection Encounters in 1923 and soon became part of the literary circles surrounding the Bloomsbury Group.
Her best-known novels include The Last September, The House in Paris, The Death of the Heart, and The Heat of the Day. Her writing often examines family, desire, secrecy, and emotional isolation, while her wartime fiction captures the unease of life in London during World War II. She also worked for the British Ministry of Information, reporting on Irish opinion during the war.
Bowen was awarded the CBE in 1948. Her final novel, Eva Trout, won the James Tait Black Memorial Prize in 1969 and was shortlisted for the Booker Prize in 1970. She died in London on February 22, 1973, and was buried near Bowen’s Court in County Cork.