Sir Walter Besant was a novelist and historian

Historian

A historian is a person who studies and writes about the past and is regarded as an authority on it. Historians are concerned with the continuous, methodical narrative and research of past events as relating to the human race; as well as the study of all history in time. If the individual is...

 who lived largely in London

London

London is the capital city of :England and the :United Kingdom, the largest metropolitan area in the United Kingdom, and the largest urban zone in the European Union by most measures. Located on the River Thames, London has been a major settlement for two millennia, its history going back to its...

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His sister-in-law was Annie Besant

Annie Besant

Annie Besant was a prominent British Theosophist, women's rights activist, writer and orator and supporter of Irish and Indian self rule.She was married at 19 to Frank Besant but separated from him over religious differences. She then became a prominent speaker for the National Secular Society ...

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Biography

The son of a merchant, he was born at Portsmouth

Portsmouth

Portsmouth is the second largest city in the ceremonial county of Hampshire on the south coast of England. Portsmouth is notable for being the United Kingdom's only island city; it is located mainly on Portsea Island...

, Hampshire

Hampshire

Hampshire is a county on the southern coast of England in the United Kingdom. The county town of Hampshire is Winchester, a historic cathedral city that was once the capital of England. Hampshire is notable for housing the original birthplaces of the Royal Navy, British Army, and Royal Air Force...

 and attended school at St Paul's, Southsea, Stockwell Grammar, London and King's College London

King's College London

King's College London is a public research university located in London, United Kingdom and a constituent college of the federal University of London. King's has a claim to being the third oldest university in England, having been founded by King George IV and the Duke of Wellington in 1829, and...

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During 1855, he was admitted as a pensioner

Pensioner

In common parlance, a pensioner is a person who has retired, and now collects a pension. This is a term typically used in the United Kingdom and Australia where someone of pensionable age may also be referred to as an 'old age pensioner', or OAP. In the United States, the term retiree is more...

 to Christ's College

Christ's College, Cambridge

Christ's College is a constituent college of the University of Cambridge.With a reputation for high academic standards, Christ's College averaged top place in the Tompkins Table from 1980-2000 . In 2011, Christ's was placed sixth.-College history:...

, Cambridge

University of Cambridge

The University of Cambridge is a public research university located in Cambridge, United Kingdom. It is the second-oldest university in both the United Kingdom and the English-speaking world , and the seventh-oldest globally...

, where he graduated in 1859 as 18th wrangler. After a year as Mathematical Master at Rossall School

Rossall School

Rossall School is a British, co-educational, independent school, between Cleveleys and Fleetwood, Lancashire. Rossall was founded in 1844 by St. Vincent Beechey as a sister school to Marlborough College which had been founded the previous year...

, Fleetwood

Fleetwood

Fleetwood is a town within the Wyre district of Lancashire, England, lying at the northwest corner of the Fylde. It had a population of 26,840 people at the 2001 Census. It forms part of the Greater Blackpool conurbation. The town was the first planned community of the Victorian era...

, Lancashire

Lancashire

Lancashire is a non-metropolitan county of historic origin in the North West of England. It takes its name from the city of Lancaster, and is sometimes known as the County of Lancaster. Although Lancaster is still considered to be the county town, Lancashire County Council is based in Preston...

 and a year at Leamington College, he spent 6 years as professor of mathematics at the Royal College, Mauritius

Mauritius

Mauritius , officially the Republic of Mauritius is an island nation off the southeast coast of the African continent in the southwest Indian Ocean, about east of Madagascar...

. A decline in health compelled him to resign, and he returned to England and settled in London during 1867. From 1868 to 1885 he held the position of Secretary to the Palestine Exploration Fund

Palestine Exploration Fund

The Palestine Exploration Fund is a British society often simply known as the PEF. It was founded in 1865 and is still functioning today. Its initial object was to carry out surveys of the topography and ethnography of Ottoman Palestine with a remit that fell somewhere between an expeditionary...

. During 1871, he was admitted to Lincoln's Inn

Lincoln's Inn

The Honourable Society of Lincoln's Inn is one of four Inns of Court in London to which barristers of England and Wales belong and where they are called to the Bar. The other three are Middle Temple, Inner Temple and Gray's Inn. Although Lincoln's Inn is able to trace its official records beyond...

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He published during 1868 Studies in French Poetry. Three years later he began his collaboration with writer James Rice. Among their joint productions are Ready-money Mortiboy (1872), and the Golden Butterfly (1876), both, especially the latter, very successful. This association was ended by the death of Rice during 1882. Thereafter Besant continued to write voluminously by himself, his main novels being All in a Garden Fair (which Rudyard Kipling

Rudyard Kipling

Joseph Rudyard Kipling was an English poet, short-story writer, and novelist chiefly remembered for his celebration of British imperialism, tales and poems of British soldiers in India, and his tales for children. Kipling received the 1907 Nobel Prize for Literature...

 credited in Something of Myself with inspiring him to leave India and make a career as a writer), Dorothy Forster (his own favorite), Children of Gibeon, and All Sorts and Conditions of Men. The two latter belonged to a series in which he endeavored to arouse the public conscience to the hardship among the poorest classes of cities. In this crusade Besant had considerable success, the establishment of The People's Palace in the East of London being one result. In addition to his fiction, Besant wrote largely on the history and topography

Topography

Topography is the study of Earth's surface shape and features or those ofplanets, moons, and asteroids...

 of London. His plans for this topic were left unfinished: among his books on this subject is London in the 18th Century.

Besant was a freemason

Freemasonry

Freemasonry is a fraternal organisation that arose from obscure origins in the late 16th to early 17th century. Freemasonry now exists in various forms all over the world, with a membership estimated at around six million, including approximately 150,000 under the jurisdictions of the Grand Lodge...

, serving as Master Mason in the Marquis of Dalhousie Lodge, London from 1873. He conceived the idea of a Masonic research lodge, the Quatuor Coronati Lodge

Quatuor Coronati Lodge

Quatuor Coronati Lodge No. 2076 is a Masonic lodge in London dedicated to Masonic research. Founded in 1886, the lodge meets at Freemasons' Hall, Great Queen Street....

 of which he was the first treasurer from 1886.

He was treasurer of the 'Atlantic Union', an association which sought to improve social relations between Britons and Americans.

Selected Primary Bibliography

Fiction

• The Alabaster Box. 1900.
• Alfred. 3rd ed. 1899.
• All in a Garden Fair. 3 vols. 1883.
• All Sorts and Conditions of Men. 3 vols. 1882.
• Armorel of Lyonesse. 3 vols. 1890.
• The Bell of St. Paul's. 3 vols. 1889.
• Beyond the Dreams of Avarice. 1895.
• Blind Love. By Wilkie Collins
  Wilkie Collins
  William Wilkie Collins was an English novelist, playwright, and author of short stories. He was very popular during the Victorian era and wrote 30 novels, more than 60 short stories, 14 plays, and over 100 non-fiction pieces...
  
  , completed and with preface by W. Besant. 3 vols. 1890.
• By Celia’s Arbour: A tale of Portsmouth town. With James Rice. Reprinted from The Graphic. 3 vols. 1878.
• The Captains' Room etc.. 3 vols.
• The Case of Mr. Lucraft and other tales. By the authors of Ready Money Mortiboy (with James Rice). 2 vols. 1876.
• The Changeling. 1898.
• The Chaplain of the Fleet. With James Rice 3 vols. 1881.
• Children of Gibeon. 2nd ed. 3 vols. 1886.
• The City of Refuge. 3 vols. 1896.
• Dorothy Forster. 3 vols. 1884.
• Doubts of Dives. [Speculative fiction in which a rich and poor man exchange bodies].
• A Five Years' Tryst and other stories. 1902.
• For Britain's Soldiers. By W.L. Alden, Sir W. Besant etc., with preface by C.J.C. Hyne. 1900.
• For Faith and Freedom. 3 vols. 1889.
• A Fountain Sealed. 1897.
• The Fourth Generation. 1900.
• The Golden Butterfly. With James Rice. 3 vols. 1876.
• Herr Paulus. 3 vols. 1888.
• The Holy Rose &c. 1890.
• In Deacon's Orders &c. 1895.
• The Ivory Gate. 3 vols. 1893.
• The Lady of Lynn. 1901.
• The Master Craftsman. 2 vols. 1896.
• The Monks of Thelema. With James Rice. 3 vols. 1878.
• My Little Girl. By the authors of Ready-money Mortiboy. With James Rice. 3 vols. 1873.
• No Other Way. 1902.
• The Orange Girl. 1899.
• Ready-Money Mortiboy. Repr. from Once a Week. With James Rice. 3 vols. 1872. Repr. of 1885 ed. Bath, 1974.
• The Rebel Queen. 3 vols. 1893.
• The Revolt of Man. 1882. [Speculative fiction: traditional roles of sexes are reversed].
• St. Katherine's by the Tower. 3 vols. 1891.
• The Seamy Side. With James Rice. 3 vols. 2nd. ed. 1880.
• The Ten Years' Tenant and other stories. With James Rice. 3 vols.
• This Son of Vulcan. By the authors of Ready-Money Mortiboy. With James Rice. 3 vols. 1876.
• To Call Her Mine &c. 1889.
• "Twas in Trafalgar's Bay" and other stories. With James Rice. 2nd ed. 1879.
• Uncle Jack &c. 1885.
• Verbena, Camellia, Stephanotis, &c. 1892.
• With Harp and Crown. By the authors of “Ready-Money Mortiboy.” With James Rice. 3 vols. 1875.
• The World Went Very Well Then. 3 vols. 1887.

Collected editions (fiction)

Novels by W.B. and James Rice. Library ed. 10 vols. 1887–88. Comprising in sequence Ready-Money Mortiboy, This Son of Vulcan, With Harp and Crown, The Golden Butterfly, By Celia’s Arbour, The Seamy Side, The Chaplain of the Fleet, The Case of Mr. Lucraft and Other Tales, ‘Twas in Trafalgar’s Bay and Other Stories, The Ten Years’ Tenant and Other Stories [My Little Girl, The Monks of Thelema apparently missing from this series].

Plays

• The Charm and other drawing-room plays. With W. Pollock. 1896.

General non-fiction [excluding items on London]

• "The Amusements of the People", Contemporary Review 45 (1884): 342-53.
• William Tuckwell, Art and hand work for the people, being three papers read before the Social Science Congress, Sept. 1884. By W.T., C. G. Leland, and W. Besant. Manchester, 1885.
• The Art of Fiction: A Lecture Delivered at the Royal Institution on Friday Evening, April 25, 1884. 1884. New ed., 1902.
• As we are and as we may be. 1903.
• Autobiography. With prefatory note by S. Squire Sprigge. Hutchinson, 1902.
• Bourbon' journal, August 1863. 1933.
• Captain Cook. English Men of Action. 1890.
• Constantinople. A sketch of its history from its foundation to its conquest by the Turks in 1453. By W.J.B. and Walter Besant. 1879.
• Essays and Historiettes. 1903.
• The Eulogy of Richard Jefferies. 1888.
• Fifty Years Ago. 1888.
• The French Humourists from the 12th to the 19th century. 1873.
• Gaspard de Coligny. The New Plutarch. 1879. New ed. 1894.
• Jerusalem, the City of Herod and Saladin. By W.B. and E.H. Palmer. 1871.
• The Life and Achievements of Edward Henry Palmer. 1883.
• The Pen and the Book. 1899.
• "The People’s Palace", Contemporary Review 51 (1887): 226-33.
• The Queen’s Reign and its commemoration. 1897.
• Sir Richard Whittington
  Richard Whittington
  Sir Richard Whittington was a medieval merchant and politician, and the real-life inspiration for the pantomime character Dick Whittington. Sir Richard Whittington was four times Lord Mayor of London, a Member of Parliament and a sheriff of London...
  
  , Lord Mayor of London. With James Rice. The New Plutarch. 1881. New ed. 1894.
• The Story of King Alfred. [1912].
• Studies in Early French Poetry. 1868.

Selected Books on London [volumes in the 10-volume Survey of London published by A & C. Black are included under their individual volume titles and marked with an asterisk]

• East London. 1901.
• Early London: prehistoric, Roman, Saxon, and Norman. 1908.*
• Holborn and Bloomsbury. With G. E. Mitton. Fascination of London series. 1903.
• London. 1892.
• London. City. 1910.*
• London in the Eighteenth Century. 1902.*
• London in the Nineteenth Century. 1909.*
• London in the Time of the Stuarts. 1903.*
• London in the Time of the Tudors. 1904.*
• London, North of the Thames. 1911.*
• London, South of the Thames. 1912.*
• Medieval London. 2 vols. 1906.**
• Shoreditch and the East End. With others. Fascination of London series. 1908.
• South London. 1899.
• The Strand District. With G. E. Mitton. Fascination of London series. Repr. with corrections. 1903.
• The Thames. Fascination of London series. 1903.
• Westminster. 1895.

Secondary Bibliography

• S. T. Bindoff, "East End Delight", East London Papers 3 (1960): 31–40.
• Fred W. Boege, "Sir Walter Besant: Novelist", Nineteenth Century Fiction 10 (1956): 249–80; 11 (1956): 32–60.
• Simon Eliot, "'His Generation Read His Stories': Walter Besant, Chatto and Windus and All Sorts and Conditions of Men," Publishing History 21 (1987): 25–67.
• John Goode, "The Art of Fiction: Walter Besant and Henry James," in David Howard, John Lucas, and John Goode, eds., Tradition and Tolerance in Nineteenth-Century Fiction: Critical Essays on Some English and American Novels (London: Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1966).
• Charles G. Harper, "Walter Besant’s London", Chapter VII of his A Literary Man’s London (London: Cecil Palmer, 1926), pp. 196–221.
• Gareth Stedman Jones
  Gareth Stedman Jones
  Professor Gareth Stedman Jones is a British academic and historian.Educated at St Paul's School and Lincoln College, Oxford, where he read History, Stedman Jones went on to Nuffield College, Oxford to take a DPhil....
  
  , Outcast London: A Study in the Relationship between Classes in Victorian Society (Oxford: Clarendon, 1971).
• P. J. Keating, The Working Classes in Victorian Fiction (London: Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1971).
• Peter Keating, The Haunted Study: A Social History of the English Novel 1875–1914 (London: Secker and Warburg, 1989).
• Andrew Mearns, "The Bitter Cry of Outcast London" (1883 penny pamphlet).
• G. P. Moss and M. V. Saville, From Palace to College: An Illustrated Account of Queen Mary College, University of London (London: Queen Mary College, 1985).
• Wim Neetens, "Problems of a 'Democratic Text': Walter Besant’s Impossible Story," Novel 23 (1990): 247-64.
• Alan Palmer, The East End: Four Centuries of London Life (London: John Murray, 1989).
• Review, All Sorts and Conditions of Men, Westminster Review NS 63 (January 1883): 288.
• Review, All Sorts and Conditions of Men, Spectator, 21 October 1882: 1349.
• Helen Small, "Introduction," Walter Besant, All Sorts and Conditions of Men (Oxford: OUP, 1997), x-xxv.
• Mark Spilka, "Henry James and Walter Besant: 'The Art of Fiction' Controversy," Novel 6 (1973): 101-9.
• Eileen Yeo, "Culture and Constraint in Working-Class Movements," in Eileen Yeo and Stephen Yeo, eds., Popular Culture and Class Conflict, 1590–1914: Explorations in the History of Labour and Leisure (Brighton, 1987), 155-86.

External links

• Works by Walter Besant at Internet Archive
  Internet Archive
  The Internet Archive is a non-profit digital library with the stated mission of "universal access to all knowledge". It offers permanent storage and access to collections of digitized materials, including websites, music, moving images, and nearly 3 million public domain books. The Internet Archive...