Life
1908-1980; b. Portsmouth, dg. Commander Oliver Manning, RN, of Bangor,
called ‘a poor naval officer’ [OCEL]; spent much of her youth
in of Ireland; grand-dg. of David Morrow, of ‘the Old House at Home’
inn; m. R. [‘Reg’] D. Smith, British Council lecturer and lecturer
at NUU; Bangor featuring in first novel, The Wind Changes (1937);
“The Balkan Trilogy” called by Anthony Burgess ‘the finest
fictional account of the war produced by a British writer’, televised as
Fortunes of War with Kenneth Branagh and Emma Thompson. DIL
IF2 MOR OCEL DUB
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Works
The Wind Changes (1937); Balkan Trilogy (1960-1965); Levant
Trilogy (1977-1980).
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Criticism
John
Metcalf, ‘North Down’s Literary Associations’, Supplement
to Fortnight Review (Sept. 1993) [short notice].
Introduction to Romanian Short Stories [World’s Classics] (OUP 1971).
Neville & June Braybrooke, Olivia Manning (London: Chatto 2004), 310pp. [reviewed by Philip Hensher in Spectator, 30 Oct. 2004, p.46f.)
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Notes
Desmond Clarke, Ireland in Fiction: A Guide to Irish Novels,
Tales, Romances and Folklore [Pt. 2] (Cork: Royal Carbery 1985), lists
The Wind Changes (London: Jonathan Cape 1937), 320pp. [setting,
west of Ireland; three characters seeking revolutionary leader to free
the country; psychological interest; Elizabeth is the mistress of the
other two, Seán, a lapsed Catholic, and Arion, an English poet;
all self-centred and finally frustrated.]
University of Ulster Library (Morris Collection) holds The Dreaming Shore (1950).
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Princess Grace Irish Library (Monaco)