Lytton Strachey

English author and reviewer Giles Lytton Strachey was born on March 1, 1880, and died on January 21, 1932. He created a new type of biography that combines psychological understanding and sympathy with sarcasm and wit. He was one of the founders of the Bloomsbury Group and wrote Eminent Victorians. The James Tait Black Memorial Prize was given to his book Queen Victoria (1921). On March 1, 1880, Strachey was born at Stowey House in Clapham Common, London. He was the fifth son and eleventh child...See more

English author and reviewer Giles Lytton Strachey was born on March 1, 1880, and died on January 21, 1932. He created a new type of biography that combines psychological understanding and sympathy with sarcasm and wit. He was one of the founders of the Bloomsbury Group and wrote Eminent Victorians. The James Tait Black Memorial Prize was given to his book Queen Victoria (1921). On March 1, 1880, Strachey was born at Stowey House in Clapham Common, London. He was the fifth son and eleventh child of Lieutenant General Sir Richard Strachey, an officer in the British colonial armed forces, and his second wife, Jane Grant, who became a leading supporter of women's right to vote. The name "Giles Lytton" came from a Gyles Strachey from the early 1600s and the first Earl of Lytton, who was friends with Richard Strachey when he was Viceroy of India in the late 1870s. Another person who was Lytton Strachey's uncle was the Earl of Lytton. There were thirteen children born to the Stracheys. Ten of them lived to adults, including Lytton's sister Dorothy Strachey and his youngest brother, the psychoanalyst James Strachey. See less