Hugh Walpole was only 57 when he died, but in
his own particular sphere he seemed to have been in the limelight as long as most of us can remember. That is because, having planned with much acumen to be successful he was successful from the start. This does not mean that he intended primarily to be a best-seller, though that also was added unto him. He had high ambitions to be a novelist of character, with history and romance as the background. He wrote conscientiously, with literary skill, and dashes of cleverness, with now Scott, now Meredith, now Trollope as an obvious literary precursor, and one could see that he had derived inspiration from Wordsworth and digested Stevenson. Among his best books were The Dark Forest and The Secret City, which gained sincerity by reason of the authentic personal experiences they were based on. He was a most versatile and industrious person, always writing, always interested in what may be called literary politics —the practical affairs of the world of letters, and, indeed, of artists in general. He became a patron as well as a practi- tioner of the arts. The acidity of the long notice on him in The Times has caused some comment.
* *
Previous page
