Matthew Kneale is a British writer, best known for his 2000 novel English Passengers

English Passengers

English Passengers is a 2000 historical novel written by Matthew Kneale, which won that year's Whitbread Book Award and was shortlisted for the Booker Prize and the Miles Franklin Award...

, which won the prestigious Whitbread Book Award and was also shortlisted for the Booker Prize. He went to school at Latymer Upper School and then studied Modern History at Magdalen College, Oxford

Magdalen College, Oxford

Magdalen College is one of the constituent colleges of the University of Oxford in England. As of 2006 the college had an estimated financial endowment of £153 million. Magdalen is currently top of the Norrington Table after over half of its 2010 finalists received first-class degrees, a record...

, and afterwards spent a year in Japan, when he began writing. He now lives in Italy

Italy

Italy , officially the Italian Republic languages]] under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages. In each of these, Italy's official name is as follows:;;;;;;;;), is a unitary parliamentary republic in South-Central Europe. To the north it borders France, Switzerland, Austria and...

.

Kneale is the son of the writers Nigel Kneale

Nigel Kneale

Nigel Kneale was a British screenwriter from the Isle of Man. Active in television, film, radio drama and prose fiction, he wrote professionally for over fifty years, was a winner of the Somerset Maugham Award and was twice nominated for the British Film Award for Best Screenplay...

 and Judith Kerr

Judith Kerr

Judith Kerr is a German-born British writer and illustrator who has created both enduring picture books such as the Mog series and The Tiger Who Came To Tea and acclaimed novels for older children such as the autobiographical When Hitler Stole Pink Rabbit which give a child's-eye view of the...

. His other novels include Whore Banquets (1987 – winner of the 1988 Somerset Maugham Award

Somerset Maugham Award

The Somerset Maugham Award is a British literary prize given each May by the Society of Authors. It is awarded to whom they judge to be the best writer or writers under the age of thirty-five of a book published in the past year. The prize was instituted in 1947 by William Somerset Maugham and thus...

, which was also won by his father in 1950; republished in 2002 as Mr. Foreigner), Inside Rose's Kingdom (1989), Sweet Thames (1992 – winner of the John Llewellyn Rhys Prize

John Llewellyn Rhys Prize

The John Llewellyn Rhys Prize is a literary prize awarded annually for the best work of literature by an author from the Commonwealth aged 35 or under, written in English and published in the United Kingdom...

), and When We Were Romans (2008). In 2004, he released the short story collection Small Crimes in an Age of Abundance.

English Passengers was also shortlisted for Australia's Miles Franklin Award

Miles Franklin Award

The Miles Franklin Literary Award is an annual literary prize for the best Australian ‘published novel or play portraying Australian life in any of its phases’. The award was set up according to the will of Miles Franklin , who is best known for writing the Australian classic My Brilliant Career ...

in 2000, making Kneale the first non-Australian author to be shortlisted for the award.

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