Priestley, John Boynton (1894-1984), was an English novelist, playwright, and journalist who wrote his novels in the realistic tradition of the 1800’s. His best-known novel is The Good Companions (1929), an amusing story of a wandering music-hall troupe. His nostalgic novel Lost Empires (1965) also concerns the music-hall world. Angel Pavement (1930) is a more serious novel about the business world in London. Priestley wrote many nonfiction works, including Literature and Western Man (1960). Priestley’s most popular plays include Dangerous Corner (1932) and An Inspector Calls (1945), both satires on middle-class life. Time and the Conways (1937) is a science-fiction play about time.
Priestley was born on Sept. 13, 1894, in Bradford, Yorkshire. After graduating from Cambridge University, he became a journalist in London in 1922. He died on Aug. 14, 1984.
