Stephen Gilbert (writer)

from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Stephen Gilbert (born July 22, 1912 in Newcastle , Northern Ireland ; died June 23, 2010 in Whiteabbey , Northern Ireland) was an Irish writer, best known for his novel Rise of the Rats , which was filmed under the title Willard .

Life

Gilbert was the son of the merchant William Gilbert and Evelyn Helen, nee Haig. He grew up in east Belfast . At the age of 10 he was sent to an English private school in Cheshire , then he attended the Loretto School near Edinburgh , which he left in 1930 without a degree. He then worked for a while as a journalist for the Northern Whig in Belfast until he joined his father's company, Samuel McCausland Ltd. , in the mid-1930s . , a traditional Belfast seed trade.

In 1931 he met the novelist Forrest Reid , who became a mentor and lifelong friend for 19-year-old Gilbert, who was interested in literature. The relationship between Gilbert and Reid, whose interest in friendships with significantly younger men was known, was not without problems and was not without tension. These included Reid's 1934 novel Brian Westby , an obvious portrait of Gilbert, which Gilbert juxtaposed in 1952, five years after Reid's death in 1947, with the novel The Burnaby Experiments , which mirrored the relationship from an inverted perspective.

In 1939 Gilbert volunteered in the Supplementary Reserve of the British Army, fought with the 3rd Ulster Searchlight Regiment , an air defense unit, in France and witnessed the evacuation of the British Expeditionary Force in Dunkirk .

In 1943 his first novel, The Landslide , was published, a fantastic story in which a landslide (which gave the title) exposed primeval eggs from which dragons hatch. His second novel Bombardier (1944) deals with war experiences. This was followed by Monkeyface (1948), the story of an intelligent ape trying to find its way in human society, and the aforementioned novel The Burnaby Experiments , the main character of which, the eccentric millionaire John Burnaby, induces a young man to conduct his experiments to help with "psychic translocation" and which has some traits in common with Reid.

In 1945 he married Kathleen Ferguson Stevenson, with whom he had four children. After a break of more than 15 years, in which Gilbert devoted himself to the family and company, of which he was now managing director, his last and best-known novel, Ratman's Notebooks , appeared in 1968 about a young outsider who befriends a horde of rats and who ultimately for his revenge - and raids begin. Ratman's Notebooks has now been made into two films under the title Willard , first in 1971 by Daniel Mann and again in 2003 by Glen Morgan, see Willard (2003) . In 1972 the sequel Ben came into the cinemas, whose title song of the same name was sung by the young Michael Jackson .

Some confusion arose over the authorship of Ratman's Notebooks after it was assumed that Stephen Gilbert was a pseudonym of Gilbert Ralston, the writer of the screenplay by Willard , who was also born in 1912. In addition, Gilbert is often confused with the painter of the same name Stephen Gilbert .

bibliography

  • The Landslide (1943)
  • Bombardier (1944)
  • Monkeyface (1948)
  • The Burnaby Experiments: An Account of the Life and Work of John Burnaby and Marcus Brownlow (1952)
  • Ratman's Notebooks (1968, also as Willard , 1969)
    • German: Rise of the Rats. Translated by Walter Erev. Marion von Schröder, Hamburg 1970. Also as: Willard or Uprising of the Rats. Fischer TB # 1317, 1972, ISBN 3-436-01680-2 .

literature

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Company history of Germinal Holdings Limited, formerly Samuel McCausland Limited (English, accessed on March 1, 2018).
personal data
SURNAME Gilbert, Stephen
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Irish writer
DATE OF BIRTH July 22, 1912
PLACE OF BIRTH Newcastle , Northern Ireland
DATE OF DEATH June 23, 2010
Place of death Whiteabbey , Northern Ireland