約翰·博因頓·普里斯特利

約翰·博因頓·普里斯特利 英國小説家、批評家、戲劇家。1894年9月13日生於約克郡佈雷德福德的教師家庭。1914至1919年間在陸軍中服役。後就學於劍橋，在英國文學、現代史及政治學方面成績優異。

1922年定居倫敦，為《星期六評論》等雜誌寫評論。早期著作主要是文學傳記和評論集。代表作有《喬治·梅瑞狄斯》（1926）、《托馬斯·皮科克》（1927）、《英國喜劇角色》（1925）、《英國小説》（1927）等。

1929年出版代表作流浪漢小説《好夥伴》，1930年出版現實主義小説《天使人行道》。其後又出版《英國旅行記》（1934）、《沙漠午夜》（1937）及續集《雨落神山》（1939）等書，描述個人經歷，對社會進行批評，深切同情失業羣眾悲慘的境遇。

1932年開始寫作劇本,批評英國中產階級，主要劇本有《危險的角落》（1932）、《我曾來過這裏》（1937）、《巡官登門》（1946）、《明天到家》（1949）、《玻璃籠子》（1957）等。他還自己經營劇團，曾在倫敦兩個劇院任導演。普里斯特利後期的文學批評和文學史著作以《文學和西方人》（1960）為代表。晚年研究英國社會史，代表作有《維多利亞的全盛期》（1972）、《英國人》（1973）等。卒於1984年8月14日。

約翰·波因頓·普里斯特利對中國某些讀者可能並不是一個陌生的名字，因為在現代英國文學的許多選本他們常發現少不了他的作品，無論是小説，戲劇，散文，都有他的代表作入選，這説明他名氣很大，多才而且多產。作品也受到讀者歡迎。普里斯特利對社會問題一直是關心的，這貫穿了他的寫作生涯，社會批評在他的文學創作中有十分重要的地位。普里斯特利純粹談風花雪月、鳥獸蟲魚的小品是很少的，吸引他的注意力的多半是衣食住行之類的生活俗務。就普里斯特利整個創作的散文部分而言，他的題材寬廣，文筆幽默雋永，富有個性，但就思想深度來看，若和十九世紀的散文大師如卡萊爾、羅斯金、阿諾德比較，他又缺乏系統哲學修養，不能達到他們的那處博大精深，還稱上一個思想家，他的多產也使他寫得匆忙，有的篇章難免草率粗糙，他堪稱一位優秀的散文作家，但還達不到大師的地位。

Priestley was born at 34 Manningham Road,Heaton,which he described as an "ultra-respectable" suburb of Bradford. His father was a headteacher. His mother died when he was still an infant and his father remarried four years later. Priestley was educated at Belle Vue Grammar School,which he left at sixteen to work as a junior clerk at Helm & Co.,a wool firm in the Swan Arcade. During his years at Helm & Co. （1910–1914），he started writing at night and had articles published in local and London newspapers. He was to draw on memories of Bradford in many of the works he wrote after he had moved south,including Bright Day and When We Are Married. As an old man he deplored the destruction by developers of Victorian buildings in Bradford such as the Swan Arcade,where he had his first job.

Priestley served during the First World War in the 10th Battalion,the Duke of Wellington's Regiment. He was wounded in 1916 by mortar fire. In his autobiography,Margin Released he is fiercely critical of the British Army and in particular of the officer class.

After his military service Priestley received a university education at Trinity Hall,Cambridge. By the age of 30 he had established a reputation as a humorous writer and critic. His novel Benighted （1927） was adapted into the James Whale film The Old Dark House （1932）； the novel has been published under the film's name in the United States.

Priestley's first major success came with a novel,The Good Companions （1929），which earned him the James Tait Black Memorial Prize for fiction and made him a national figure. His next novel,Angel Pavement （1930） further established him as a successful novelist. However,some critics were less than complimentary about his work,and Priestley began legal action against Graham Greene for what he took to be a defamatory portrait of him in the novel Stamboul Train （1932）.

In 1934 he published the travelogue English Journey,which is an account of what he saw and heard while travelling through the country in the autumn of the previous year.

He moved into a new genre and became equally well known as a dramatist. Dangerous Corner was the first of a series of plays that enthralled West End theatre audiences. His best-known play is An Inspector Calls （1945），later made into a film starring Alastair Sim released in 1954. His plays are more varied in tone than the novels,several being influenced by J. W. Dunne's theory of time,which plays a part in the plots of Dangerous Corner （1932） and Time and the Conways （1937）.

Many of his works have a socialist aspect. For example,An Inspector Calls,as well as being a "Time Play",contains many references to socialism — the inspector was arguably an alter ego through which Priestley could express his views.

During World War Ⅱ,he was a regular broadcaster on the BBC. The Postscript,broadcast on Sunday night through 1940 and again in 1941,drew peak audiences of 16 million; only Churchill was more popular with listeners. But his talks were cancelled. It was thought that this was the effect of complaints from Churchill that they were too left-wing; however,Priestley's son has recently revealed in a talk on the latest book being published about his father's life that it was in fact Churchill's Cabinet that brought about the cancellation by supplying negative reports on the broadcasts to Churchill.

Priestley chaired the 1941 Committee,and in 1942 he was a co-founder of the socialist Common Wealth Party. The political content of his broadcasts and his hopes of a new and different England after the war influenced the politics of the period and helped the Labour Party gain its landslide victory in the 1945 general election. Priestley himself,however,was distrustful of the state and dogma.

Priestley's name was on Orwell's list,a list of people which George Orwell prepared in March 1949 for the Information Research Department,a propaganda unit set up at the Foreign Office by the Labour government. Orwell considered these people to have pro-communist leanings and therefore to be inappropriate to write for the IRD.

He was a founding member of the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament in 1958.

Although Priestley never wrote a formal book of memoirs,his literary reminiscences,Margin Released （1962），provide valuable insights into his work. The section dealing with his job as a teenage clerk in a Bradford wool-sorter's office manages to weave fine literature from an outwardly unpromising subject – a characteristic of many of his novels.

His interest in the problem of time led him to publish an extended essay in 1964 under the title of Man and Time (Aldus published this as a companion to Carl Jung's Man and His Symbols). In this book he explored in depth various theories and beliefs about time as well as his own research and unique conclusions,including an analysis of the phenomenon of precognitive dreaming,based in part on a broad sampling of experiences gathered from the British public,who responded enthusiastically to a televised appeal he made while being interviewed in 1963 on the BBC programme,Monitor. Priestley managed the treatment of this potentially esoteric subject matter with warmth and competence.

Priestley was one of the interviewees for the documentary series The World at War （1973），in the episode "Alone: May 1940 – May 1941". He declined lesser honours before accepting the Order of Merit in 1977.

The University of Bradford awarded Priestley the title of honorary Doctor of Letters in 1970,and he was awarded the Freedom of the City of Bradford in 1973. His connections with the city were also marked by the naming of the J. B. Priestley Library at the University of Bradford,which he officially opened in 1975,[7] and by the larger-than-life statue of him,commissioned by the Bradford City Council after his death,which now stands in front of the National Media Museum.[8]

A special collector's edition of Bright Day was re-issued by Great Northern Books in 2006,celebrating the 60th anniversary of the publication of this novel.

Priestley had a deep love of classical music,and in 1941 he played an important part in organising and supporting a fund-raising campaign on behalf of the London Philharmonic Orchestra,which was struggling to establish itself as a self-governing body after the withdrawal of Sir Thomas Beecham. In 1949 the opera The Olympians by Arthur Bliss,to a libretto by Priestley,was premiered.

He married three times. In 1921 he married Emily "Pat" Tempest,a music-loving Bradford librarian. Two daughters were born in 1923 and 1924,but in 1925 his wife died of cancer. In September 1926,he married Jane Wyndham-Lewis (ex-wife of the original 'Beachcomber' D. B. Wyndham-Lewis,no relation to the artist Wyndham Lewis); they had two daughters and one son. In 1953,he divorced his second wife and married the archaeologist and writer Jacquetta Hawkes,his collaborator on the play Dragon's Mouth.

Adam in Moonshine （1927）Benighted （1928） The Good Companions （1929） Angel Pavement （1930） Faraway （1932） Wonder Hero （1933） They Walk in the City （1936） The Doomsday Men （1937） Let the People Sing （1939） Blackout in Gretley （1942） Daylight on Saturday （1943） Three Men in New Suits （1945） Bright Day （1946） Jenny Villiers （1947） Festival at Farbridge （1951） Low Notes on a High Level （1954） The Magicians （1954） Saturn over the Water （1961） The Thirty-First of June （1961） Salt Is Leaving （1961） The Shapes of Sleep （1962） Sir Michael and Sir George （1964） Lost Empires （1965） It's an Old Country （1967） The Image Men Vol. 1: Out of Town （1968） The Image Men Vol. 2: London End （1968） Found Lost Found （1976） Paperback; ISBN 0-7493-2281-0 /ISBN 978-0-7493-2281-6 (UK edition); Publisher: Mandarin

- 31 June （1978） (TV) Russian film; aka 31 июня

●Farthing Hall （1929） (Novel written in collaboration with Hugh Walpole)

●The Town Mayor of Miraucourt （1930） (Short story published in a limited edition of 525 copies)

●I'll Tell You Everything （1932） (Novel written in collaboration with Gerald Bullett)

●Albert Goes Through （1933） (Novelette)

●The Other Place （1952） (Short Stories)

●Snoggle （1971） (Novel for children)

●The Carfitt Crisis （1975） (Short stories)

Dangerous Corner （1932）

Laburnum Grove （1933）

Eden End （1934）

Time and the Conways （1937）

I Have Been Here Before （1937）

When We Are Married （1938）

Johnson Over Jordan （1939）

They Came to a City （1943）

An Inspector Calls （1945）

The Linden Tree （1947）

Last Holiday （1950,wrote story,screenplay and produced the film）

His play The Thirty-first of June was first produced in Toronto in 1957.

The Thirty-first of June: A Tale of True Love,Enterprise and Progress in the Arthurian and AD-Atomic Ages - Novel. December 1961: Hardback; ISBN 0-434-60326-0 /ISBN 978-0-434-60326-8 (UK edition); Publisher: William Heinemann Ltd - BBC radio dramatization; one and a half hours - Novel. 1996 : Paperback; ISBN 0-7493-2281-0 /ISBN 978-0-7493-2281-6 (UK edition); Publisher: Mandarin - 31 June （1978） (TV) Russian film; aka 31 июня

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