Witching Hill, by E. W. Hornung (Paperback)
Brand : Wildside Press
- SKU:
- 1434408701
Ernest William Hornung (1866-1921) was an English author, most famous for writing the Raffles series of novels about a gentleman thief in late Victorian London.
Hornung was born in Middlesbrough, England, the third son and youngest of eight children of John Peter Hornung, who was born in Hungary. Ernest Hornung was educated at Uppingham School during some of the later years of its great headmaster, Edward Thring. Hornung spent most of his life in England and France, but in December 1883 left for Australia, arrived in 1884 and stayed for two years where he worked as a tutor at Mossgiel station in the Riverina. Although his Australian experience was brief, it coloured most of his literary work from "A Bride from the Bush" published in 1899, to "Old Offenders and a few Old Scores," which appeared after his death. Nearly two-thirds of his 30 published novels make reference to Australian incidents and experiences.
Hornung returned to England in February 1886, and married Constance Aimée Monica Doyle (1868-1924), the sister of his friend Sir Arthur Conan Doyle in 1893. The character of A. J. Raffles, a "gentleman thief," first appeared in Cassell's Magazine in 1898 and the stories were later collected as "The Amateur Cracksman" (1899). Other titles in the series include "The Black Mask" (1901), "A Thief in the Night" (1905), and the full-length novel "Mr. Justice Raffles" (1909). He also co-wrote the play "Raffles, The Amateur Cracksman" with Eugene Presbrey in 1903.
After Hornung spent time in the trenches with the troops in France, he published "Notes of a Camp-Follower on the Western Front" in 1919, a detailed account of his time there.
Hornung died in Saint-Jean-de-Luz, in the south of France on 22 March 1921.