Henry Green

Although Green’s novels are unfashionable, he has been called one of the most innovative and imaginative 20th-century writers in English. Orwell, Waugh and Powell were all met at school. Lewis was his tutor at Oxford, Green resenting the work expected of him as interfering with his cinema-going and flow of ideas. His good friend Isherwood described ‘Living’ as the best proletarian novel ever. Among his great admirers, Welty maintained a long correspondence, while Sarraute was sympathetic to his alcohol and writer’s block problems; Updike however never met him. Southern, an unlikely close friend, called him a writer’s writer’s writer.