Long Fiction:
The Wooden Horse, 1909
Maradick at Forty, 1910
Mr. Perrin and Mr. Traill, 1911 (also known as The Gods and Mr. Perrin)
The Prelude to Adventure, 1912
Fortitude, 1913
The Duchess of Wrexe, 1914
The Golden Scarecrow, 1915
The Dark Forest, 1916
The Green Mirror, 1917
Jeremy, 1919
The Secret City, 1919
The Captives, 1920
The Young Enchanted, 1921
The Cathedral, 1922
Jeremy and Hamlet, 1923
The Old Ladies, 1924
Portrait of a Man with Red Hair, 1925
Harmer John, 1926
Jeremy at Crale, 1927
Wintersmoon, 1928
Hans Frost, 1929
Rogue Herries, 1930
Above the Dark Circus, 1931 (also known as Above the Dark Tumult)
Judith Paris, 1931
The Fortress, 1932
Vanessa, 1933
Captain Nicholas, 1934
The Inquisitor, 1935
A Prayer for My Son, 1936
John Cornelius, 1937
The Joyful Delaneys, 1938
The Sea Tower, 1939
The Bright Pavilions, 1940
The Blindman’s House, 1941
The Killer and the Slain, 1942
Katherine Christian, 1943
Short Fiction:
The Thirteen Travellers, 1921
The Silver Thorn, 1928
All Souls’ Night, 1933
Head in Green Bronze, 1938
Nonfiction:
Joseph Conrad, 1916
The English Novel, 1925
Anthony Trollope, 1928
A Letter to a Modern Novelist, 1932
The Apple Trees, 1932
Hugh Seymour Walpole (WAWL-pohl) was born in Auckland, New Zealand, March 13, 1884, the son of an English minister serving as incumbent of St. Mary’s Pro-Cathedral in Auckland. As a boy, Walpole was sent to school in Cornwall, England. His family returned to England and lived in Durham, a cathedral city; Walpole’s father served as bishop of Edinburgh from 1910 until his death in 1929.
Hugh Walpole was educated at King’s College, Canterbury, and Emanuel College, Cambridge. He began writing novels while still an undergraduate, but without success in his early ventures. His first successful novel was Fortitude, published in 1913, and his popularity as a writer of fiction on both sides of the Atlantic began with that work.
During World War I Walpole worked in Russia with the Red Cross, and two novels grew out of his experiences there: The Dark Forest and The Secret City, awarded the James Tait Black Memorial Prize. Most of Walpole’s books have a romantic tinge, and many of them enjoyed large sales. His most successful novels are parts of a tetralogy covering two hundred years of English social history: Rogue Herries, Judith Paris, The Fortress, and Vanessa.
At the time of King George VI’s coronation, Walpole was knighted and proudly bore his title. Prolific in his novel writing, Walpole also wrote short stories, critical studies, and plays; wrote scenarios for films in both Hollywood and Britain; and enjoyed great success on numerous lecture tours to the United States and in Britain. W. Somerset Maugham caricatured him as the character Alroy Kear in Cakes and Ale. Walpole died at Brackenburn, his home in the Lake District, on June 1, 1941.