Cyril Vernon Connolly ('Palinurus') was born at Coventry in 1903 and educated at Eton and Balliol College, Oxford. An essayist, critic, editor and novelist, he was, until his death in 1974, considered one of the most significant figures on the British literary scene. He founded the literary magazine Horizon in 1939 and edited it until its closure in 1950. He contributed to the New Statesman and many other periodicals, was literary editor of the Observer, and was on the literary staff of the Sunday Times, to which he contributed a weekly book review. His other books include Enemies of Promise, The Rock Pool, The Condemned Playground, Ideas and Places, The Missing Diplomats, Previous Convictions, The Modern Movement and The Evening Colonnade. Cyril Connolly was made an Honorary Member of the American Academy and National Institute of Arts and Letters in 1974 and was also a Chevalier of the Legion of Honour. He was awarded the CBE in 1972.
