Bowen, Elizabeth

Bowen, Elizabeth (bō`ĭn), 1899–1973, Anglo-Irish novelist, b. Dublin. In impeccable prose she treated love and frustration through studies of complex psychological relationships. Her novels include The Hotel (1927), To the North (1932), The House in Paris (1936), The Death of the Heart (1938), and The Heat of the Day (1949). In her last three novels—A World of Love (1955), Two Little Girls (1964), and Eva Trout; or, Changing Scenes (1968)—Bowen was less concerned with rendering reality than with exploring truths best expressed in myth or parable. Look at All Those Roses (1941), Ivy Gripped the Steps (1946), and A Day in the Dark and Other Stories (1965) are volumes of short stories. Nonfiction works include Bowen's Court (1942), on her ancestral home; The Shelbourne Hotel (1951); and Seven Winters; and Afterthoughts (1962), a collection of childhood memories and literary studies. Pictures and Conversations (1975) is a collection of miscellaneous writings, including portions of a novel and autobiography left unfinished at Bowen's death.

Bibliography

See biographies by E. J. Kenney (1975), V. Glendinning (1978), P. Craig (1987), and N. Corcoran (2005); studies by H. Blodgett (1975), H. Bloom, ed. (1987), A. E. Austin (rev. ed. 1989), P. Lassner (1991), A. Bennett and N. Royle (1994), R. C. Hoogland (1994), L. Christensen (2001), and M. Ellmann (2003).

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Bowen, Elizabeth (Dorothea Cole)

(born June 7, 1899, Dublin, Ire.—died Feb. 22, 1973, London, Eng.) Irish-born British novelist and short-story writer. Among her novels are The House in Paris (1935), The Death of the Heart (1938), and The Heat of the Day (1949). Her short-story collections include The Demon Lover (1945). Her finely wrought prose style frequently details uneasy and unfulfilling relationships among the upper middle class. Her essays appear in Collected Impressions (1950) and Afterthought (1962).