Hughes, Richard Arthur Warren

(1900-1976)

   Of Welsh descent, he was born in Weybridge, Surrey, educated at Charterhouse School, Godalming, Surrey, and graduated from Oriel College, Oxford, in 1922. Hughes lived most of his life in Wales. He was vice president of the Welsh National Theatre from 1924 to 1936. During World War II he worked for the Admiralty and, with J.D. Scott, wrote The Administration of War Production (1955). He was a fellow of the Royal Society of Literature, was appointed to the Order of the British Empire in 1946, and in 1956 received an honorary doctor of letters from the University of Wales. He was Gresham professor of rhetoric at Gresham College, London, from 1954 to 1957. His radio play Danger, believed to be the first radio play, was broadcast by the BBC in 1924. His 1929 novel A High Wind in Jamaica was filmed in 1965 starring Anthony Quinn, James Coburn, Dennis Price and Nigel Davenport. Gipsy Night: And Other Poems was published in 1922 while Huges was still at university. Some of his poems: "Burial of the Spirit of a Young Poet," "Explanation, on Coming Home Late," "Felo de Se," "Invocation to the Muse," "Old Cat Care," "Winter."

   Sources: Dictionary of National Biography. Electronic Edition 1.1. Oxford University Press, 1997. Eight Lines and Under: An Anthology of Short, Short Poems. William Cole, ed. Macmillan, 1967. Fantastic Fiction (http://www.fantasticfiction.co.uk/authors/Richard_Hughes.htm). Modern British Poetry. 7th rev. ed. Louis Untermeyer, ed. Harcourt, Brace, 1962. The Columbia Granger's Index to Poetry. 11th ed. The Columbia Granger's World of Poetry, Columbia University Press, 2005 (http://www.columbiagrangers.org). The Oxford Book of Welsh Verse in English. Gwyn Jones, ed. Oxford University Press, 1977. The Oxford Companion to English Literature. 6th edition. Margaret Drabble, ed. Oxford University Press, 2000.