EBOOK Maurice Bowra:A Life

Maurice Bowra was, according to one's point of view, either the most distinguished        or the most notorious Oxford don of the early twentieth century. Classicist, poet,        wit, raconteur extraordinary, and Warden of Wadham College for over thirty years, he        met nearly everyone of consequence in the worlds of literature and politics and had        stories to tell about them all, from Jean Cocteau to Virginia Woolf, from Adolf        Hitler to the Kennedys, from Isaiah Berlin to Charlie Chaplin. By forceof        personality and intellectual range, he influenced the thinking of almost everyone        with whom he came into contact.Above all, brought up in Edwardian England, he was        able to chart the ways in which the values of his youth were tested by new        democratic ideas. His experiences allowed him to develop and employ theories of        education that were startling, and which would mould the thinking of a generation of        English intellectuals.Based upon a wide range of interviews and previously        unpublished manuscript material, this is the first ever biography of Bowra, and        covers every aspect of his life, from soldier on the Western Front to Oxford        classicist, from celebrated wit to frustrated poet manqu