Charles Gilson
Charles James Louis Gilson (8 July 1878 – 18 May 1943),[1] better-known as Captain and then Major Charles Gilson, was a British military men and author of several well-known books of adventure for boys.
Contents
Biography
Charles Gilson was born in Dedham, Essex, the son of Charles Rawlinson Gilson and Flora Macdonald Robertson.[2] He was educated at Dulwich College[3] and entered the army at the age of eighteen. Gilson was wounded in the Boer War (1899-1902) and began writing in order to pass the time. He later served in China, Japan, Australia, Canada and Africa. His adventure stories, based in first-hand experience all over the world, were usually published in serial form before being made into books.
Graham Greene was a great admirer of Gilson[4] and film-maker David Lean once remarked how he "used to wait for the news agent to bring the copy [of The Boy's Own Paper magazine] on Wednesdays, whenever it came out, so I could continue reading Gilson's serials".[5]
He died in Kensington, London in 1943.
Works
- The Lost Column: A Story of the Boxer Rebellion in China. London: Hodder and Stoughton (1909)
- The Lost Island. London: Hodder and Stoughton (1910)
- The Refugee. New York: The Century Co. (1910)
- The Pirate Aeroplane. London: Hodder and Stoughton (1913)
- The Race Round the World. London: Hodder and Stoughton (1914)
- The Mystery of Ah Jim. London: "The Boy's Own Paper" Office (1919)
- The Scarlet Hand. London: "The Boy's Own Paper" Office (1920)
- The Realm of the Wizard King. London: "The Boy's Own Paper" Office (1922)
- The Lost City. London: "The Boy's Own Paper" Office (1923)
- The Spy. London: Oxford University Press (1923)
- The Silver Shoe. London: "The Boy's Own Paper" Office (1924)
- The Treasure of the Lost Tribe. London: Cassell (1926)
- Wild Metal. Indianapolis: The Bobbs-Merrill Company (1932)
- Chances and Mischances. London: Jarrolds (1932) — his memoirs
- The City of the Sorcerer. London: Hutchinson and Co. (1934)
- The Cat and the Curate: A Phenomenal Experience. New York: Frederick A Stokes (1934)
- Queen of the Andes. London: Frederick Warne and Co. (1935) — as "Barbara Gilson"
- The Cunning of Quang. London: Oxford University Press (1935)
- The Bronze Casket: A Tale of the Air. London: Frederick Warne and Co. (1938)
Notes
- ↑ "Gilson, Charles," Encyclopedia of Science Fiction. Retrieved 17 September 2017.
- ↑ Chen, Shih-Wen (2016). Representations of China in British Children's Fiction, 1851-1911. Routledge.
- ↑ The Boy's Own Annual, Vol. XLIV, 1921, p. 34.
- ↑ Donaghy, Henry J. (1992). Conversations with Graham Greene. Jackson and London: University Press of Mississippi, p. 85.
- ↑ Silverman, Stephen M. (1992). David Lean. New York: Harry N. Abrams, p. 20.