John Fowles: English Novelist and Existentialist
John Robert Fowles (31 March 1926 – 5 November 2005) was an English novelist critically positioned between modernism and postmodernism. His work was influenced by Jean-Paul Sartre and Albert Camus, and he became best known for The French Lieutenant’s Woman (1969), a Victorian-era romance with a postmodern twist that established his international reputation.
Early Life and Education
Fowles was born in Leigh-on-Sea in Essex, the only son of Robert John Fowles, who worked for the family tobacco import business Allen & Wright, and Gladys May Richards. His father had trained as a lawyer but took over the firm after his brother died in the Battle of Ypres. During his childhood, Fowles was a close companion to his mother and his cousin Peggy Fowles until he was ten.
He attended Alleyn Court Preparatory School and in 1939 won a place at Bedford School, where he remained until 1944. At Bedford he became head boy and excelled athletically, serving as captain of the cricket team. After leaving school, Fowles completed a Naval Short Course at the University of Edinburgh and received a commission in the Royal Marines, finishing his training on 8 May 1945. He was assigned to Okehampton Camp, Devon, for two years.
Following his military service in 1947, Fowles entered New College, Oxford, where he studied French and German before concentrating on French, earning his BA with second class honours in 1950. At Oxford he underwent a political transformation, later writing that upon leaving the marines he “began to hate what I was becoming in life—a British Establishment young hopeful. I decided instead to become a sort of anarchist.” It was also at Oxford that he first considered becoming a writer, inspired by reading existentialists such as Sartre and Camus and the prevailing intellectual atmosphere emphasizing “authenticity” and “freedom.”
Career and Achievements
Fowles spent his early adult life as a teacher. His first position after Oxford was at the University of Poitiers for one year. In 1951, he became an English master at the Anargyrios and Korgialenios School of Spetses on the Greek island of Spetses, a sojourn that proved transformative. On the island he met Elizabeth Christy, then married to another teacher, Roy Christy. During 1953, Fowles and the other masters were dismissed for attempting to institute reforms. He returned to England and married Elizabeth on 2 April 1957, becoming stepfather to her daughter Anna. For nearly ten years he taught English as a foreign language at St. Godric’s College in Hampstead, London.
In late 1960, Fowles began working on The Collector while having already drafted The Magus. He completed his first draft of The Collector in a month and spent over a year revising before submitting to his agent. Publisher Michael S. Howard at Jonathan Cape was enthusiastic, and the book was published in 1963. When paperback rights sold that spring, it commanded what was probably the highest price paid for a first novel to that date. British reviewers praised it as an innovative thriller, while several American critics detected existentialist thought in the work. The success of The Collector allowed Fowles to leave teaching and pursue writing full-time. The book was adapted as a feature film in 1965.
Against his publisher’s advice, Fowles insisted his second published work be The Aristos (1964), a non-fiction collection of philosophical essays. He then collated his drafts of The Magus, which he adapted for cinema; the 1968 film version was generally considered unsuccessful. In 1965, Fowles moved to Underhill, a farm on the fringes of Lyme Regis, Dorset, which inspired the setting for his next major work. In 1968, he and Elizabeth moved to Belmont in Lyme Regis, a house he used as a setting in The French Lieutenant’s Woman (1969). This novel, featuring one of the most enigmatic female characters in literary history, was released to critical and popular success and was translated into more than ten languages. It was adapted as a feature film in 1981 with a screenplay by Harold Pinter and starring Meryl Streep and Jeremy Irons.
Fowles lived the rest of his life in Lyme Regis, writing from Belmont House. His subsequent novels included The Ebony Tower (1974), Daniel Martin (1977), Mantissa (1982), and A Maggot (1985). He also composed poems and short stories throughout his life, most of which were lost or destroyed. In 2008, The Times named Fowles one of the fifty greatest British writers since 1945.
Notable Events and Milestones
Fowles served as curator of the Lyme Regis Museum from 1979 to 1988, retiring after suffering a mild stroke. He was occasionally involved in local politics, writing letters to The Times advocating preservation, though he was generally considered reclusive. In 1990, his first wife Elizabeth died of cancer only a week after diagnosis, an event that affected him severely and caused him to stop writing for a year. In 1998, he married his second wife, Sarah Smith. Fowles died of heart failure on 5 November 2005, aged 79, at Axminster Hospital, five miles from Lyme Regis.
Awards and Honors
In 2008, The Times named Fowles one of the fifty greatest British writers since 1945.
Additional Resources
Fowles’s books have been translated into many languages, and several have been adapted as films. In 1998, he was quoted in the New York Times Book Review as saying, “Being an atheist is a matter not of moral choice, but of human obligation.”
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