Newby, P. H. (1918-1997), a British author, won the first Booker Prize in 1969. The prize is the United Kingdom’s highest literary award. Newby won the Booker Prize for his novel Something to Answer For (1968).
Newby served in the Royal Army Medical Corps in France and Egypt from 1939 to 1942, during World War II. He then became a lecturer in English literature from 1942 to 1946 at Fuad I University (now Cairo University) in Cairo, Egypt. His experiences living in Egypt had a decisive impact on his writing. Much of Newby’s fiction is set in Egypt and deals, often in a humorous way, with the clash between Middle Eastern and European cultures.
Something to Answer For is set in Egypt in 1956, during the Suez Canal crisis when the United Kingdom and France invaded Egypt in an attempt to gain control of the canal. The central character is Jack Townrow, a petty criminal from England whose moral character is altered by the canal crisis.
Egypt or Egyptian characters also appear in Newby’s novels A Journey to the Interior (1945), his first published book; A Step to Silence (1952); The Retreat (1953); The Picnic at Sakkara (1955); Revolution and Roses (1957); A Guest and His Going (1959); Kith (1977); Feelings Have Changed (1981); and Leaning in the Wind (1986).
Newby also wrote three nonfiction works about Egypt. The Egypt Story (1979) combines his text with a collection of photographs. The Warrior Pharaohs (1980) is an account of the rise and fall of the Egyptian empire during the New Kingdom, the period from about 1539 to 1075 B.C. Saladin in His Time (1983) is a biography of the great Muslim warrior of the A.D. 1100’s.
Percy Howard Newby was born in Crowborough, England, on June 25, 1918. From 1949 to 1978, he served as a management executive of the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC). From 1978 to 1984, he was chairman of the English Stage Company, a prominent theater company. Newby died on Sept. 6, 1997.
