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Andrew Sinclair

Andrew Annandale Sinclair FRSL FRSA (21 January 1935 – 30 May 2019) was a British novelist, historian, biographer, critic, filmmaker, and a publisher of classic and modern film scripts. He has been described as a "writer of extraordinary fluency and copiousness, whether in fiction or in American social history".

Early life and education

Born in Oxford in 1935, Sinclair was educated at Eton College and Trinity College, Cambridge, where he studied history and received a BA degree and a PhD. From 1959 to 1961 he was a Harkness Fellow at Harvard University.[1]

Writer and filmmaker

Before going up to Cambridge, Sinclair undertook his National Service as an Ensign with the Coldstream Guards and wrote a novel based on the experience, called The Breaking of Bumbo (1958).[1] "At the age of 22, Andrew Sinclair woke up one morning to find himself, like Byron, suddenly famous".[2] In 1959 Sinclair published his second novel My Friend Judas. It was reissued in 2009 by Faber Finds along with The Breaking of Bumbo.[3]

Sinclair became the Managing Director of Timon Films in 1967.[1] Three years later, in 1970, he adapted The Breaking of Bumbo for the big screen; it starred Joanna Lumley and was a critical failure.[4] He then directed the film adaptation of Under Milk Wood (1972), now regarded as a classic, which featured Richard Burton as the narrator. His final film as a director was Blue Blood (1973), starring Oliver Reed.

Sinclair's book The Better Half: The Emancipation of the American Woman won the Somerset Maugham Prize in 1967.[5] His biographies covered a wide variety of famous people: Che Guevara, Dylan Thomas, Jack London, John Ford, J Pierpont Morgan and Francis Bacon. He was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature in 1972.[6] His most recent work was his autobiography, Storytelling: A Sort of Memoir (2018).[7]

A critical assessment of Sinclair by Bernard Bergonzi began: "From the beginning Andrew Sinclair established himself as a writer of extraordinary fluency and copiousness, whether in fiction or in American social history".[8]

Historian

Sinclair was a founding member of Churchill College, Cambridge, and was Director of Historical Studies at the college between 1961 and 1963. Following a year spent as a Fellow at the American Council of Learned Societies, he returned to Britain to become a Lecturer in American History at University College London (UCL), working there from 1965 to 1967.[1] His writings on persons and themes of American history are identified in his bibliography, below.

Screenplay publisher

In 1966 Sinclair, together with the filmmaker Peter Whitehead, founded Lorrimer Publishing, which published the original screenplays of classic films. Sheridan Morley wrote: "Their format is a simple one: the script itself, with detailed descriptions where action takes over from the words, published with a brief introduction and sideline notes where necessary."[9] Some 70 filmscripts were published, including The Blue Angel and The Third Man.

Personal life

Andrew Sinclair married three times:

As a result of his third marriage, Sinclair was the stepfather of Peter Mond, 4th Baron Melchett, politician and environmentalist, and Kerena Ann Mond and Pandora Mond, the artist.[10]

In the 1960s Sinclair was instrumental in saving from demolition the historic buildings in Narrow Street, Limehouse. For his book The Last of the Best (1969), he was assisted by Jacquemine Charrott Lodwidge as researcher.[11]

Bibliography

Non-fiction

Fiction

Uncollected short stories

Selected filmography

Publisher of screenplays: bibliography

Film scripts published by Lorrimer Publishing, London:[14]

References

  1. ^ a b c d e "Sinclair, Andrew Annandale". Who's Who & Who Was Who. Vol. 2022 (online ed.). A & C Black. (Subscription or UK public library membership required.)
  2. ^ "Andrew Sinclair obituary: Polymathic novelist, speechwriter and film director whose colourful career was characterised by literary feuds and exotic marriages". The Times. London. Retrieved 6 June 2019.
  3. ^ Andrew Sinclair|Authors|Faber & Faber
  4. ^ "IMDb, The Breaking of Bumbo". IMDb. Retrieved 5 February 2018..
  5. ^ "Previous winners of the Somerset Maugham Awards". The Society of Authors. Retrieved 6 February 2018.
  6. ^ "Royal Society of Literature Current RSL Fellows". Royal Society of Literature. Retrieved 6 February 2018.
  7. ^ Ashgrove Publishing Ltd; Amazon: Andrew Sinclair page. ASIN 1853981893.
  8. ^ Bernard Bergonzi, cited in D. L. Kirkpatrick and James Vinson (eds), Contemporary Novelists, 3rd ed. (New York: St Martin's Press, 1982), p. 588. ISBN 9780312167660
  9. ^ Morley, Sheridan (2011). "Wholly Experience: Lorrimer Series Review, "Films and Filming", 1966". Framework: The Journal of Cinema and Media. 52 (1). Drake Stutesman; Wayne State University Press: 362–3. doi:10.1353/frm.2011.0000. JSTOR 41553490. S2CID 194097455.
  10. ^ "Sinclair, Sonia Elizabeth, (Mrs A. A. Sinclair)". Who's Who. Vol. 2022 (online ed.). A & C Black. (Subscription or UK public library membership required.)
  11. ^ Andrew Sinclair, The last of the best: the aristocracy of Europe in the twentieth century (London: Macmillan, 1969), p. 186
  12. ^ Gale, Floyd C. (December 1961). "Galaxy's 5 Star Shelf". Galaxy Science Fiction. pp. 144–147.
  13. ^ O'Brien, Mike (6 September 2014). "Dylan on Dylan/Under Milk Wood". Take One. Retrieved 29 March 2024.
  14. ^ Unless further stipulated, this bibliography derives from Morsberger, Robert E.; Morsberger, Katherine M. (1975). "Screenplays as Literature: Bibliography and Criticism". Film Literature Quarterly. 3 (1). Salisbury University: 45–59. JSTOR 43795384. and/or "Classic and Modern Film Scripts (Lorrimer) - Book Series List". Retrieved 24 February 2018.
  15. ^ a b Sterrit, David (1999). The Films of Jean-Luc Godard: Seeing the Invisible. Cambridge University Press. p. 279. ISBN 0521589711.
  16. ^ Kubrick, Stanley (1972). Stanley Kubrick's 'A Clockwork Orange': Based on the Novel by Anthony Burgess. ISBN 978-0-85647-019-6.
  17. ^ Shakespeare, William; Olivier, Laurence (1984). Henry V. ISBN 9780856470042.
  18. ^ Polanski, Roman; Skolimowski, Jerzy (1984). Knife in the Water. ISBN 0856470929.
  19. ^ Burton, Alan; Chibnall, Steve (2013). Historical Dictionary of British Cinema. Scarecrow Press. p. 537. ISBN 978-0810880269.
  20. ^ Kurosawa, Akira (1984). Seven Samurai: A Film. ISBN 0856470864.
  21. ^ Comden, Betty; Green, Adolph (1986). The Band Wagon. ISBN 9780856471186.
  22. ^ Lania, Leo; Pabst, Georg Wilhelm; Balázs, Béla; Brecht, Bertolt; Vajda, Ladislaus (1984). The Threepenny Opera. ISBN 978-0-85647-006-6.
  23. ^ a b Fields, W. C. (1973). W. C. Fields in Never Give a Sucker an Even Break: And Tillie and Gus. ISBN 978-0-85647-017-2.
  24. ^ "Item no longer available".

Acknowledgement

External links