Lionel Davidson (31 March 1922 – 21 October 2009) was an English novelist who wrote a number of acclaimed spy thrillers.
Lionel Davidson was born in 1922 in Hull, Yorkshire, one of nine children of an immigrant Jewish tailor. He left school early and worked in the London offices of the Spectator magazine as an office boy. Later, he joined the Keystone Press Agency. During World War II, he served with the Submarine Service of the Royal Navy.
When ...
more
Lionel Davidson (31 March 1922 – 21 October 2009) was an English novelist who wrote a number of acclaimed spy thrillers.
Lionel Davidson was born in 1922 in Hull, Yorkshire, one of nine children of an immigrant Jewish tailor. He left school early and worked in the London offices of the Spectator magazine as an office boy. Later, he joined the Keystone Press Agency. During World War II, he served with the Submarine Service of the Royal Navy.
When the war ended, he returned to the Keystone Agency and travelled all over Europe as a freelance reporter. It was during one of these trips that he got the idea for his first thriller. The Night of Wenceslas was published in 1960. Set in Czechoslovakia during the Cold War, the novel tells the story of young Nicolas Whistler, a 24-year-old Londoner whose business trip to Prague goes horribly awry. Its taut prose and masterful plot made The Night of Wenceslas an instant, massive success, and immediately pushed Davidson into the front ranks of the...
less
