by John Fowles

John Robert Fowles was born March 31, 1926, at Leigh Upon Sea, Essex. He served two years in the military before attending Oxford University, where he studied French language and literature. After graduating in 1950, Fowles went on to teach English in France, Greece, and Britain. In 1954 he married Elizabeth Whitton, whom he had met in Greece, becoming at the same time stepfather to her daughter from a prior marriage. Fowles’s first published novel, The Collector (1963) sold well and was generally, if not universally, well reviewed (Aubrey, pp. 91-92). Its success enabled Fowles to leave teaching and write full time. His second, The Magus (published in 1965, although actually written much earlier) fared less well, often being dismissed as pretentious (Aubrey, p. 100). Therefore, the success of his third novel, The French Lieutenant’s Woman, which catapulted him to...