Coordinates	49°46′59″N18°25′22″N
name	John Donne
birth date	January 21, 1572
birth place	London, England
death date	March 31, 1631
death place	London
occupation	Poet, Priest, Lawyer
nationality	English
genre	Satire, Love poetry, Elegy, Sermons
subject	Love, sexuality, religion, death
movement	Metaphysical Poetry
influences	William Shakespeare
influenced	W. B. Yeats, Ernest Hemingway, T. S. Eliot, Dylan Thomas, W. H. Auden}}

John Donne ( ; 21 January 1572 – 31 March 1631), English poet, satirist, lawyer, and priest, is now considered the preeminent representative of the metaphysical poets. His works are notable for their strong and sensual style and include sonnets, love poetry, religious poems, Latin translations, epigrams, elegies, songs, satires and sermons. His poetry is noted for its vibrancy of language and inventiveness of metaphor, especially as compared to that of his contemporaries. John Donne's style is characterised by abrupt openings, various paradoxes, ironies, dislocations. These features in combination with his frequent dramatic or everyday speech rhythms, his tense syntax, and his tough eloquence were both a reaction against the smoothness of conventional Elizabethan poetry and an adaptation into English of European baroque and mannerist techniques. His early career was marked by poetry that bore immense knowledge of British society and he met that knowledge with sharp criticism. Another important theme in Donne’s poetry was the idea of true religion, which was something that he spent a lot of time considering and theorising about. He wrote secular poems as well as erotic poems and love poems. Donne is particularly famous for his mastery of metaphysical conceits.

Despite his great education and poetic talents, he lived in poverty for several years, relying heavily on wealthy friends. He spent much of the money he inherited during and after his education on womanising, literature, pastimes and travel. In 1601 Donne secretly married Anne Moore with whom he had 12 children. In 1615 he became an Anglican priest although he did not want to take Anglican orders. He did so because King James I persistently ordered it. In 1621, he was appointed the Dean of St Paul's Cathedral in London. He also served as a member of parliament in 1601 and again in 1614.

Early life

John Donne was born in London, England, into a Roman Catholic family at a time when practice of that religion was illegal in England. Donne was the third of six children. His father, also named John Donne, was of Welsh descent, and a warden of the Ironmongers Company in the City of London. Donne's father was a respected Catholic who avoided unwelcome government attention out of fear of being persecuted for his religious faith.

Donne's father died in 1576, leaving his wife, Elizabeth Heywood, the responsibility of raising their children. Elizabeth Heywood was also from a recusant Catholic family, the daughter of John Heywood, the playwright, and sister of Rev. Jasper Heywood, a Jesuit priest and translator. She was a great-niece of the Catholic martyr Thomas More. This tradition of martyrdom would continue among Donne’s closer relatives, many of whom were executed or exiled for religious reasons. Donne was educated privately; however there is no evidence to support the popular claim that he was taught by Jesuits. Donne's mother married Dr. John Syminges, a wealthy widower with three children, a few months after Donne's father died. In 1577, his mother died, followed by two more of his sisters, Mary and Katherine, in 1581.

Donne was a student at Hart Hall, now Hertford College, Oxford, from the age of 11. After three years at Oxford he was admitted to the University of Cambridge, where he studied for another three years. He was unable to obtain a degree from either institution because of his Catholicism, since he could not take the Oath of Supremacy required of graduates.

In 1591 he was accepted as a student at the Thavies Inn legal school, one of the Inns of Chancery in London. In 1592 he was admitted to Lincoln’s Inn, one of the Inns of Court. His brother Henry was also a university student prior to his arrest in 1593 for harbouring a Catholic priest, William Harrington, whom Henry betrayed under torture. Harrington was tortured on the rack, hanged until not quite dead, then was subjected to disembowelment. Henry Donne died in Newgate prison of bubonic plague, leading John Donne to begin questioning his Catholic faith.

During and after his education, Donne spent much of his considerable inheritance on women, literature, pastimes and travel. Although there is no record detailing precisely where he travelled, it is known that he travelled across Europe and later fought with the Earl of Essex and Sir Walter Raleigh against the Spanish at Cádiz (1596) and the Azores (1597) and witnessed the loss of the Spanish flagship, the ''San Felipe''. According to Izaak Walton, who wrote a biography of Donne in 1640: }}

By the age of 25 he was well prepared for the diplomatic career he appeared to be seeking. He was appointed chief secretary to the Lord Keeper of the Great Seal, Sir Thomas Egerton, and was established at Egerton’s London home, York House, Strand close to the Palace of Whitehall, then the most influential social centre in England.

Marriage to Anne More

During the next four years he fell in love with Egerton's niece Anne More, and they were married just before Christmas in 1601 against the wishes of both Egerton and George More, Lieutenant of the Tower and Anne's father. This ruined Donne's career and earned him a short stay in Fleet Prison, along with the priest who married them and the man who acted as a witness to the wedding. Donne was released when the marriage was proven valid, and soon secured the release of the other two. Walton tells us that when he wrote to his wife to tell her about losing his post, he wrote after his name: ''John Donne, Anne Donne, Un-done.'' It was not until 1609 that Donne was reconciled with his father-in-law and received his wife's dowry.

Following his release, Donne had to accept a retired country life in Pyrford, Surrey. Over the next few years he scraped a meagre living as a lawyer, depending on his wife’s cousin Sir Francis Wolly to house him, his wife, and their children. Since Anne Donne had a baby almost every year, this was a very generous gesture. Though he practised law and worked as an assistant pamphleteer to Thomas Morton, Donne was in a constant state of financial insecurity, with a growing family to provide for.

Anne bore him 12 children in 16 years of marriage (including two stillbirths—their eighth and then in 1617 their last child); indeed, she spent most of her married life either pregnant or nursing. The 10 surviving children were named Constance, John, George, Francis, Lucy (after Donne's patroness Lucy, Countess of Bedford, her godmother), Bridget, Mary, Nicholas, Margaret and Elizabeth. Francis, Nicholas and Mary died before they were ten. In a state of despair, Donne noted that the death of a child would mean one fewer mouth to feed, but he could not afford the burial expenses. During this time Donne wrote, but did not publish, ''Biathanatos,'' his defence of suicide. His wife died on 15 August 1617, five days after giving birth to their twelfth child, a still-born baby. Donne mourned her deeply, including writing the 17^th Holy Sonnet. He never remarried; this was quite unusual for the time, especially as he had a large family to bring up.

Early poetry

Donne's earliest poems showed a developed knowledge of English society coupled with sharp criticism of its problems. His satires dealt with common Elizabethan topics, such as corruption in the legal system, mediocre poets, and pompous courtiers. His images of sickness, vomit, manure, and plague assisted in the creation of a strongly satiric world populated by all the fools and knaves of England. His third satire, however, deals with the problem of true religion, a matter of great importance to Donne. He argued that it was better to examine carefully one's religious convictions than blindly to follow any established tradition, for none would be saved at the Final Judgment, by claiming "A Harry, or a Martin taught [them] this."

Donne's early career was also notable for his erotic poetry, especially his elegies, in which he employed unconventional metaphors, such as a flea biting two lovers being compared to sex. In ''Elegy XIX: To His Mistress Going to Bed'', he poetically undressed his mistress and compared the act of fondling to the exploration of America. In ''Elegy XVIII'', he compared the gap between his lover's breasts to the Hellespont. Donne did not publish these poems, although did allow them to circulate widely in manuscript form.

Career and later life

Donne was elected as Member of Parliament for the constituency of Brackley in 1602, but this was not a paid position and Donne struggled to provide for his family, relying heavily upon rich friends. The fashion for coterie poetry of the period gave him a means to seek patronage and many of his poems were written for wealthy friends or patrons, especially Sir Robert Drury, who came to be Donne's chief patron in 1610. Donne wrote the two ''Anniversaries'', ''An Anatomy of the World'' (1611) and ''Of the Progress of the Soul'', (1612), for Drury. While historians are not certain as to the precise reasons for which Donne left the Catholic Church, he was certainly in communication with the King, James I of England, and in 1610 and 1611 he wrote two anti-Catholic polemics: ''Pseudo-Martyr'' and ''Ignatius his Conclave''. Although James was pleased with Donne's work, he refused to reinstate him at court and instead urged him to take holy orders. At length, Donne acceded to the King's wishes and in 1615 was ordained into the Church of England.

Donne became a Royal Chaplain in late 1615, Reader of Divinity at Lincoln's Inn in 1616, and received a Doctor of Divinity degree from Cambridge University in 1618. Later in 1618 he became chaplain to Viscount Doncaster, who was on an embassy to the princes of Germany. Donne did not return to England until 1620. In 1621 Donne was made Dean of St Paul's, a leading (and well-paid) position in the Church of England and one he held until his death in 1631. During his period as Dean his daughter Lucy died, aged eighteen. It was in late November and early December 1623 that he suffered a nearly fatal illness, thought to be either typhus or a combination of a cold followed by the seven-day relapsing fever. During his convalescence he wrote a series of meditations and prayers on health, pain, and sickness that were published as a book in 1624 under the title of ''Devotions upon Emergent Occasions''. One of these meditations, Meditation XVII, later became well known for its phrase "for whom the bell tolls" and the statement that "no man is an island". In 1624 he became vicar of St Dunstan-in-the-West, and 1625 a Royal Chaplain to Charles I. He earned a reputation as an eloquent preacher and 160 of his sermons have survived, including the famous Death’s Duel sermon delivered at the Palace of Whitehall before King Charles I in February 1631.

Later poetry

Some have speculated that Donne's numerous illnesses, financial strain, and the deaths of his friends all contributed to the development of a more somber and pious tone in his later poems. The change can be clearly seen in "An Anatomy of the World" (1611), a poem that Donne wrote in memory of Elizabeth Drury, daughter of his patron, Sir Robert Drury of Hawstead, Suffolk. This poem treats Elizabeth's demise with extreme gloominess, using it as a symbol for the Fall of Man and the destruction of the universe.

The poem "A Nocturnal upon S. Lucy's Day, Being the Shortest Day", concerns the poet's despair at the death of a loved one. In it Donne expresses a feeling of utter negation and hopelessness, saying that "I am every dead thing...re-begot / Of absence, darkness, death." This famous work was probably written in 1627 when both Donne's friend Lucy, Countess of Bedford, and his daughter Lucy Donne died. Three years later, in 1630, Donne wrote his will on Saint Lucy's day (* December), the date the poem describes as "Both the year's, and the day's deep midnight."

The increasing gloominess of Donne's tone may also be observed in the religious works that he began writing during the same period. His early belief in the value of scepticism now gave way to a firm faith in the traditional teachings of the Bible. Having converted to the Anglican Church, Donne focused his literary career on religious literature. He quickly became noted for his sermons and religious poems. The lines of these sermons would come to influence future works of English literature, such as Ernest Hemingway's ''For Whom the Bell Tolls'', which took its title from a passage in Meditation XVII of Devotions upon Emergent Occasions, and Thomas Merton’s ''No Man is an Island'', which took its title from the same source.

Towards the end of his life Donne wrote works that challenged death, and the fear that it inspired in many men, on the grounds of his belief that those who die are sent to Heaven to live eternally. One example of this challenge is his Holy Sonnet X, from which come the famous lines “Death, be not proud, though some have called thee / Mighty and dreadful, for thou art not so.” Even as he lay dying during Lent in 1631, he rose from his sickbed and delivered the Death's Duel sermon, which was later described as his own funeral sermon. Death’s Duel portrays life as a steady descent to suffering and death, yet sees hope in salvation and immortality through an embrace of God, Christ and the Resurrection.

Death

It is thought that his final illness was stomach cancer, although this has not been proven. He died on 31 March 1631 having written many poems, most only in manuscript. Donne was buried in old St Paul's Cathedral, where a memorial statue of him was erected (carved from a drawing of him in his shroud), with a Latin epigraph probably composed by himself. Donne's monument survived the 1666 fire, and is on display in the present building.

Style

His work has received much criticism over the years, especially concerning his metaphysical form. Donne is generally considered the most prominent member of the Metaphysical poets, a phrase coined in 1781 by the critic Dr Johnson, following a comment on Donne by the poet John Dryden. Dryden had written of Donne in 1693: ''"He affects the metaphysics, not only in his satires, but in his amorous verses, where nature only should reign; and perplexes the minds of the fair sex with nice speculations of philosophy, when he should engage their hearts, and entertain them with the softnesses of love."'' In ''Life of Cowley'' (from Samuel Johnson's 1781 work of biography and criticism ''Lives of the Most Eminent English Poets''), Johnson refers to the beginning of the seventeenth century in which there "appeared a race of writers that may be termed the metaphysical poets". Donne's immediate successors in poetry therefore tended to regard his works with ambivalence, with the Neoclassical poets regarding his conceits as abuse of the metaphor. However he was revived by Romantic poets such as Coleridge and Browning, though his more recent revival in the early twentieth century by poets such as T. S. Eliot and critics like F R Leavis tended to portray him, with approval, as an anti-Romantic.

Donne's work suggests a healthy appetite for life and its pleasures, while also expressing deep emotion. He did this through the use of conceits, wit and intellect—as seen in the poems "The Sun Rising" and "Batter My Heart".

Donne is considered a master of the metaphysical conceit, an extended metaphor that combines two vastly different ideas into a single idea, often using imagery. An example of this is his equation of lovers with saints in "The Canonization". Unlike the conceits found in other Elizabethan poetry, most notably Petrarchan conceits, which formed clichéd comparisons between more closely related objects (such as a rose and love), metaphysical conceits go to a greater depth in comparing two completely unlike objects. One of the most famous of Donne's conceits is found in "A Valediction: Forbidding Mourning" where he compares two lovers who are separated to the two legs of a compass.

Donne's works are also witty, employing paradoxes, puns, and subtle yet remarkable analogies. His pieces are often ironic and cynical, especially regarding love and human motives. Common subjects of Donne's poems are love (especially in his early life), death (especially after his wife's death), and religion.

John Donne's poetry represented a shift from classical forms to more personal poetry. Donne is noted for his poetic metre, which was structured with changing and jagged rhythms that closely resemble casual speech (it was for this that the more classical-minded Ben Jonson commented that "Donne, for not keeping of accent, deserved hanging").

Some scholars believe that Donne's literary works reflect the changing trends of his life, with love poetry and satires from his youth and religious sermons during his later years. Other scholars, such as Helen Gardner, question the validity of this dating—most of his poems were published posthumously (1633). The exception to these is his ''Anniversaries'' which were published in 1612 and ''Devotions upon Emergent Occasions'' published in 1624. His sermons are also dated, sometimes specifically by date and year.

Legacy

John Donne is commemorated as a priest in the calendar of the Church of England and in the Calendar of Saints of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America on 31 March.

Sylvia Plath, interviewed on BBC Radio in late 1962, said the following about a book review of her collection of poems titled ''The Colossus'' that had been published in the United Kingdom two years earlier: "I remember being appalled when someone criticised me for beginning just like John Donne but not quite managing to finish like John Donne, and I felt the weight of English literature on ''me'' at that point."

The memorial to John Donne, modelled after the engraving pictured above, was one of the few such memorials to survive the Great Fire of London in 1666 and now appears in St Paul's Cathedral, where Donne is buried.

Donne in literature

Donne has appeared in several works of literature:

A dying John Donne scholar is the main character of Margaret Edson's Pulitzer prize-winning play ''Wit'' (1999), which was made into the film ''Wit'' starring Emma Thompson.

Donne's ''Songs and Sonnets'' feature in ''The Calligrapher'' (2003), a novel by Edward Docx.

In the 2006 novel ''The Meaning of Night'' by Michael Cox, Donne's works are frequently quoted.

John Donne appears, along with his wife Anne and daughter Pegge, in the award-winning novel ''Conceit'' (2007) by Mary Novik.

Joseph Brodsky has a poem called "Elegy for John Donne".

The love story of John Donne and Anne More is the subject of Maeve Haran's 2010 historical novel ''The Lady and the Poet''.

An excerpt from "Meditation 17 Devotions Upon Emergent Occasions" serves as the opening for Ernest Hemingway's "For Whom The Bell Tolls".

Marilynne Robinson's Pulitzer prize-winning novel Gilead makes several references to Donne's work.

John Donne is the favourite poet of Dorothy Sayers' fictional detective Lord Peter Wimsey, and the Wimsey books include numerous quotations from and allusions to his work.

A quotation from Donne became especially widely known due to serving as the motto (and the source for the title) of Ernest Hemingway's "For Whom the Bell Tolls".

John Donne's poem 'A Fever' (incorrectly called 'The Fever') is mentioned in the penultimate paragraph of the novel "The Silence of the Lambs" by Thomas Harris.

Donne in pop culture and songs

John Renbourn, on his 1966 debut album ''John Renbourn'', sings a version of the poem, "Song: Go and Catch a Falling Star". (He alters the last line to "False, ere I count one, two, three".)

Tarwater, in their album called ''Salon des Refusés'', have put "The Relic" to song.

Children of Bodom, in the song "Follow the Reaper" reference John Donne's Holy Sonnet 10

Metallica in the song "For Whom the Bell Tolls" reference Meditation 17 from Devotions upon Emergent Occasions

Titus Andronicus, in their 2008 song "Albert Camus", quote from Donne's Holy Sonnet 10

Jethro Tull, in the song "Teacher" uses the line "No man is an Island" from Meditation 17 from Devotions upon Emergent Occasions

Van Morrison pays homage to John Donne in "Rave on John Donne," from his album ''Inarticulate Speech of the Heart.''

''Lost in Austen'', the British mini series based on Jane Austen's ''Pride and Prejudice'', has Bingley refer to John Donne when he describes taking Jane to America, "John Donne, don't you know? 'License my roving hands,' and so forth."

In ''Howl's Moving Castle,'' a novel written by Diana Wynne Jones, the poem, "Song: Go and Catch a Falling Star", is used as the basis for a curse on the main character.

Loudon Wainwright III, in his 1986 song ''Hard Day On The Planet'', affirms "A man ain't an island; John Donne wasn't lying"

Indie Rock band mewithoutYou use words from A Valediction: Forbidding Mourning in their song "Everything Was Beautiful, and Nothing Hurt", from their album A-B Life.

Bob Chilcott has arranged a choral piece to John Donne's "Go and Catch a Falling Star".

In the British dark comedy Psychoville, the character David recites a John Donne poem to his dying mother, she asks him if he had just wrote that. He replied "No, John Donne" to which she says, "No David, its John Did", attempting to correct his cockney.

Bibliography

Poetry

''Poems'' (1634)

''Poems on Several Occasions'' (2001)

''Love Poems'' (1905)

''John Donne: Divine Poems (includes the Holy Sonnets), Sermons, Devotions and Prayers'' (1990)

''The Complete English Poems'' (1991)

''John Donne's Poetry'' (1991)

''John Donne: The Major Works'' (2000)

''The Complete Poetry and Selected Prose of John Donne'' (2001)

Prose

''Six Sermons'' (1633)

''Fifty Sermons'' (1649)

''Paradoxes, Problemes, Essayes, Characters'' (1652)

''Essayes in Divinity'' (1651)

''Sermons Never Before Published'' (1661)

''John Donne's 1622 Gunpowder Plot Sermon'' (1996)

''Devotions Upon Emergent Occasions and Death's Duel'' (1999; first published in 1624)

See also

Cleanth Brooks. "The Language of Paradox", ''Literary Theory: An Anthology'' 2nd edition; Julie Rivkan, Michael Ryan (eds) pp. 28–39 (2004)

References

Bald, R. C. ''John Donne: A Life.'', Oxford, 1970

Le Comte, Edward. ''Grace to a Witty Sinner: A Life of Donne'', (Walker, 1965)

Stubbs, John. ''Donne: The Reformed Soul'', Viking, 2006. ISBN 0-670-91510-6

Lim, Kit. ''John Donne: An Eternity of Song'', Penguin, 2005.

Warnke, Frank J. ''John Donne'', (U of Mass., Amherst 1987)

Notes

External links

John Donne at archive.org

Selected works (audio recordings) at LibriVox.org

John Donne at Crossref-it.info

John Donne at Luminarium.org

Poems by John Donne at PoetryFoundation.org

The Literature Network

John Donne's Monument, St Paul's Cathedral

Homepage of the John Donne Society

Donne undone: Review of "John Donne: The Reformed Soul"(John Stubbs), Guardian Unlimited, 22 July 2006, by Andrew Motion.

Selected Poems of John Donne

Complete sermons of John Donne

John Donne: Sparknotes

The Donne Variorum

Digital Donne (digital images of early Donne editions and manuscripts)

Examples of John Donne's poetic forms

Category:1572 births Category:1631 deaths Category:People from the City of London Category:Anglican poets Category:English Anglican priests Category:Converts to Anglicanism from Roman Catholicism Category:English poets Category:English songwriters Category:English translators Category:Alumni of Hart Hall, Oxford Category:Alumni of the University of Cambridge Category:Anglican saints Category:People celebrated in the Lutheran liturgical calendar Category:Members of the pre-1707 Parliament of England Category:Sonneteers Category:Deans of St Paul's Category:Anglo-Welsh poets Category:Prisoners in Fleet Prison

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Coordinates	49°46′59″N18°25′22″N
name	Julian Glover
birth name	Julian Wyatt Glover
birth date	March 27, 1935
birth place	Hampstead, England, United Kingdom
occupation	Actor
years active	1950s–present
spouse	Eileen Atkins (1957–1966)Isla Blair (1968–present)
website	}}

Julian Wyatt Glover (born 27 March 1935) is an English actor best known for such roles as General Maximilian Veers in ''Star Wars Episode V: The Empire Strikes Back'', the Bond villain Aristotle Kristatos in ''For Your Eyes Only'', and Walter Donovan in ''Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade''.

Personal life

Glover was born in Hampstead, the son of Honor Ellen Morgan (née Wyatt), a close friend of the novelist Barbara Pym, and Claude Gordon Glover, a BBC radio producer. His half-brother is the musician Robert Wyatt. Glover has been twice married to actresses; Eileen Atkins in 1957 (divorced 1966) and since 1968, Isla Blair, with whom he has a son, actor Jamie Glover, currently starring in the fourth series of ''Waterloo Road'' on the BBC. In 2006, he held the role of Edward Alleyn Club President.

Career

Glover attended Bristol Grammar School in Bristol, England, where he was in the same class as actors Timothy West and Darth Vader actor David Prowse, and also Alleyn's School in Dulwich. Glover trained at the National Youth Theatre and performed with the Royal Shakespeare Company. In the early 1950s, he appeared in several shows at Unity Theatre, London. During the 1960s and 1970s, Glover frequently appeared in British television shows, including ''The Avengers'', ''Doctor Who'', ''The Saint'', ''Strange Report'' and ''Blake's 7''.

Julian Glover also appeared in 1967's ''Quatermass and the Pit'', a Hammer Films adaptation of Nigel Kneale's 1950s BBC television original, in which he portrayed Quatermass' nemesis, Colonel Breen, a military man, initially sceptical of the ancient origin of an archaeologically excavated extraterrestrial spacecraft, who is later ironically in thrall to the murderous energy released from the craft. In 1979, he appeared as the villain, Scaroth, last of the Jagaroth, in the ''Doctor Who'' story ''City of Death'', one of the most popular serials in the original run. He later recorded DVD commentaries for recently rediscovered ''The Crusade'' episode "The Wheel of Fortune" (from the Lost in Time (Doctor Who) DVD set) and ''City of Death''.

Glover also appeared opposite Roger Moore in the episode of ''The Saint'' titled "Invitation to Danger."

He made some of his most notable appearances during the 1980s as the Imperial General Maximilian Veers in ''Star Wars Episode V: The Empire Strikes Back'' (1980), the ruthless Greek villain Aris Kristatos in the James Bond film ''For Your Eyes Only'' (1981), and the deceptive American Nazi Walter Donovan in ''Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade'' (1989). During the 1980s, he played the leading role in the BBC television drama series, ''By the Sword Divided''.

He voiced the giant spider Aragog in the 2002 film version of ''Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets''.

Glover has been associated with the Anglo-Saxon epic poem Beowulf since the 1980s, delivering various forms of staged interpretation. Taking the role of an Anglo-Saxon gleeman or traveller poet he delivers an abridged version of the tale whilst stood around a mead hall hearth. This powerful 11th century Old English text, set in the dark age Germanic world of the Geats, examines Anglo-Saxon concepts of honour and comitatus. The performance is interspersed with Glover rendering selected passages in the original Old English. This adaptation has been shown in documentaries on both the English Language and Anglo-Saxon England. Most recently, it was shown in Michael Wood's documentary 'Beowulf', broadcast during the BBC Poetry Season on BBC Four and BBC Two in 2009.

He recently played the role of Mr. Brownlow in the West End revival of the musical ''Oliver!'' at the Theatre Royal, Drury Lane.

Glover plays a 101-year-old Polish veteran RAF pilot in the short film "Battle for Britain" (2010).

Since 2011 he portrays the character of Grand Maester Pycelle in HBO's ''Game of Thrones'', the TV adaptation of the first volume of George R.R. Martin's fantasy novel series ''A Song of Ice and Fire''.

He is an Associate Member of the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art.

Awards

His performance in the title role of the Royal Shakespeare Company's staging of Henry IV, Part 1 and Part 2, at the Barbican Centre in London, earned him the Laurence Olivier Award for Best Actor in 1993.

He was awarded the Laurence Olivier Award in 1993 (1992 season) for Best Actor in a Supporting Role for Henry V at the Royal Shakespeare Company.

Filmography

''Tom Jones'' (1963) – Lt. Northerton

''Girl with Green Eyes'' (1964) – Malachi Sullivan

''Time Lost and Time Remembered'' (1965) – Dr. Matthew Langdon

''The Alphabet Murders'' (1965) – Don Fortune

''Doctor Who – The Crusade'' (1965) – Richard the Lionheart

''Theatre of Death'' (1966) – Charles Marquis

''Quatermass and the Pit'' (1967) – Col. Breen

''The Avengers'' – The Living Dead (1967) — Masgard

''The Magus'' (1968) – Anton

''Alfred the Great'' (1969) – Athelstane

''The Adding Machine'' (1969) – Shrdlu

''The Last Grenade'' (1970) – Andy Royal

''Wuthering Heights'' (1970) – Hindley Earnshaw

''The Rise and Rise of Michael Rimmer'' (1970) – Col. Moffat

''Nicholas and Alexandra'' (1971) – Gapon

''Antony and Cleopatra'' (1972) – Proculeius

''Luther'' (1973) – The Knight

''Hitler: The Last Ten Days'' (1973) – Gruppenführer Hermann Fegelein

''Dead Cert'' (1974) – Lodge

''Terror on the Britannic'' (1974) – Commander Marder

''The Internecine Project'' (1974) – Arnold Pryce-Jones

''Juggernaut'' (1974) – Commander Marder

''Space: 1999 – Alpha Child'' (1975) – Jarak

''Gulliver's Travels'' (1977) – (voice)

''The Brute'' (1977) – Teddy

''Doctor Who – City of Death'' (1979) – Scaroth/Count Scarlioni

''Invasion'' (1980) – Alexander Dubcek

''Star Wars Episode V: The Empire Strikes Back'' (1980) – General Maximilian Veers

''For Your Eyes Only'' (1981) – Aristotle Kristatos

''Ivanhoe'' (1982) – King Richard

''Dombey and Son'' – Mr. Dombey

''Heat and Dust'' (1983) – Crawford, the District Collector

''Hearts of Fire'' (1987) – Alfred

''The Fourth Protocol'' (1987) – Brian Harcourt-Smith

''Cry Freedom'' (1987) – Don Card

''Wish Me Luck'' (1987–1989) – Colonel James Cadogan

''Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade'' (1989) – Walter Donovan

''Tusks'' (1990) – Ian Taylor

''Treasure Island'' (1990) – Dr. Livesey

''Letters, Riddles and Writs'' – Joseph Haydn

''King Ralph'' (1991) – King Gustav

''Power and Lovers'' (1994) – Matthew

''The Chief'' (1995) – Andrew Blake

''The House of Angelo'' (1997) – Sir Robert Willoughby

''Vatel'' (2000) – Prince de Condé

''The Book of Eve'' (2002) – Burt Smallwood

''Two Men Went to War'' (2002) – Col. Hatchard

''Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets'' (2002) – Aragog (voice)

''Troy'' (2004) – Triopas

''Strings'' (2004) – Kahro (English version voice)

''Scoop'' (2006) – Lord Lyman

''Mirrors'' (2008) – Robert Esseker

''The Young Victoria'' (2009) – Duke of Wellington

''Game of Thrones'' (2011) – Grand Maester Pycelle

References

External links

The Strange Case of Springheel'd Jack New audio series starring Julian Glover

Category:1935 births Category:English film actors Category:English stage actors Category:English television actors Category:Living people Category:Actors from London Category:Old Bristolians Category:People from Hampstead Category:Royal Shakespeare Company members Category:People educated at Alleyn's School

de:Julian Glover fr:Julian Glover ko:쥴리언 글러버 it:Julian Glover ms:Julian Glover nds:Julian Glover pl:Julian Glover pt:Julian Glover fi:Julian Glover sv:Julian Glover tr:Julian Glover

Coordinates	49°46′59″N18°25′22″N
Name	Fiona Shaw
Birth name	Fiona Mary Wilson
Birth date	July 10, 1958
Birth place	County Cork, Republic of Ireland
Occupation	Actress, director
Years active	1983–present }}

Fiona Shaw, CBE (born Fiona Mary Wilson on 10 July 1958) is an Irish actress and theatre director. Although to international audiences she is probably most familiar for her minor role as Petunia Dursley in the ''Harry Potter'' films, she is an accomplished classical actress. Shaw was awarded an honorary CBE in 2001.

Early life

Shaw was born as Fiona Mary Wilson in County Cork, Ireland to a mixed-religious couple, and was raised Roman Catholic. Her father was an optic surgeon and her mother was a physicist.

She attended secondary school at Scoil Mhuire in Cork City. She received her degree in University College Cork. She trained at the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art (RADA) in London and was part of 'new wave’ of actors to emerge from the Academy. She received much acclaim as Julia in the National Theatre production of Richard Sheridan's ''The Rivals'' (1983), a role which demonstrated her gift for comedy. Despite her natural comic abilities, Shaw has opted more often than not for roles showcasing her extreme but unaffected emotional intensity. These performances have earned her numerous stage awards.

Career

Her notable theatrical roles include Young Woman in ''Machinal'', Celia in ''As You Like It'' (1984), Madame de Volanges in ''Les Liaisons Dangereuses'' (1985), Katherine in ''The Taming of the Shrew'' (1987), Winnie in ''Happy Days'' (2007), and the title roles in ''Electra'' (1988), ''The Good Person of Sechuan'' (1989), ''Hedda Gabler'' (1991), ''The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie'' (1998) and ''Medea'' (2000). She performed T. S. Eliot's poem ''The Waste Land'' as a one-person show at the Liberty Theatre in New York to great acclaim in 1996, winning the Drama Desk Award for Outstanding One-Person Show for her performance.

Shaw played the lead in ''Richard II'', directed by Deborah Warner in 1995. Shaw has collaborated with Warner on a number of occasions, on both stage and screen. Shaw has also worked in film and television, including ''My Left Foot'', ''Jane Eyre'', ''Persuasion'', ''Gormenghast'', and five of the ''Harry Potter'' films in which she played Harry Potter's insufferable aunt Petunia Dursley. Shaw had a brief but key role in Brian DePalma's ''The Black Dahlia''.

In 2008, she directed her first opera, ''Riders to the Sea'' by Vaughan Williams at the ENO.

In 2009, Shaw collaborated with Deborah Warner again, taking the lead role in Tony Kushner's translation of Bertolt Brecht's ''Mother Courage and Her Children''. In a 2002 article for ''The Daily Telegraph'', Rupert Christiansen described their professional relationship as "surely one of the most richly creative partnerships in theatrical history." Other collaborations between the two women include productions of Brecht's ''The Good Woman of Szechuan'' and Ibsen's ''Hedda Gabler'', the latter was adapted for television.

Shaw appeared in ''The Waste Land'' at Wilton's Music Hall in January 2010 and in a National Theatre revival of ''London Assurance'' in March 2010. In November 2010, Shaw starred in Ibsen's ''John Gabriel Borkman'' at the Abbey Theatre, Dublin alongside Alan Rickman and Lindsay Duncan.

Shaw has become a regular cast member of the TV Show ''True Blood''. Shaw’s character, Marnie Stonebrook, has been described as an underachieving palm reader who is spiritually possessed by an actual witch. Her character leads a coven of necromancer witches who threaten the status quo in Bon Temps, erasing most of Eric Northman's memories and leaving him almost helpless when he tries to break up their coven.

Personal life

Shaw has been romantically linked in the press with actress Saffron Burrows. Neither actress has publicly commented on the relationship. The two appeared together in the National Theatre's production of ''The PowerBook'', a play based on the novel of the same name by Jeanette Winterson in which they played lovers. In an interview with the ''New Statesman'' published on 24 September 2009, Shaw stated that she lives in Primrose Hill where she "has lived ... on and off for a long time". In a December 2009 interview, Shaw described herself as "very happily" single.

Credits

''The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes'' (1985) (TV series)

''The Taming Of The Shrew (RSC 1987)''

''Electra (RSC 1988)''

''My Left Foot'' (1989)

''Mountains of the Moon'' (1990)

''Three Men and a Little Lady'' (1990)

''Hedda Gabler'' (1993) (a televisation of the NT production)

''Super Mario Bros.'' (1993)

''Undercover Blues'' (1993)

''Persuasion'' (1995)

''Jane Eyre'' (1996)

''Anna Karenina'' (1997)

''The Butcher Boy'' (1997)

''The Avengers'' (1998)

''The Last September'' (1999)

''Gormenghast'' (2000) (TV)

''Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone'' (2001)

''Medea'' (2001) (West End & NYC)

''The Seventh Stream'' (2001)

''Doctor Sleep'' (2002)

''The Triumph of Love'' (2002)

''Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets'' (2002)

''The PowerBook'' (2002) (NT, which she co-devised)

''Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban'' (2004)

''Midsummer Dream'' (2005)

''Empire'' (2005, international tour) (TV)

''The Black Dahlia'' (2006)

''Catch and Release'' (2007)

''Fracture'' (2007)

''Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix'' (2007)

''Happy Days'' (2007 & 2008, NT and internationally)

''Dorian Gray'' (2009)

''Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows - Part 1'' (2010)

'' Noi Credevamo'' (2010)

''Mother Courage and her Children (NT)''

''London Assurance (NT)''

''The Tree of Life'' (2011)

''True Blood'' (2011)

Other projects, contributions

''When Love Speaks'' (2002, EMI Classics) - "It is thy will thy image should keep open"

'' Simon Schama's John Donne- 2009

References

External links

World Theatre - ''Working in the Theatre Seminar'' video at American Theatre Wing.org, January 2002

Fiona Shaw interviewed by Sophie Elmhirst on New Statesman, September 2009

Category:1958 births Category:Alumni of the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art Category:Alumni of University College Cork Category:Honorary Commanders of the Order of the British Empire Category:Irish film actors Category:Irish stage actors Category:Irish television actors Category:Irish theatre directors Category:Irish voice actors Category:Audio book narrators Category:Shakespearean actors Category:Living people Category:LGBT actors Category:Opera directors Category:Olivier Award winners Category:People from County Cork Category:Irish Roman Catholics Category:Royal National Theatre Company members Category:Royal Shakespeare Company members

ca:Fiona Shaw da:Fiona Shaw de:Fiona Shaw es:Fiona Shaw fr:Fiona Shaw fy:Fiona Shaw gl:Fiona Shaw id:Fiona Shaw it:Fiona Shaw he:פיונה שו hu:Fiona Shaw nl:Fiona Shaw ja:フィオナ・ショウ no:Fiona Shaw pl:Fiona Shaw pt:Fiona Shaw ru:Шоу, Фиона fi:Fiona Shaw sv:Fiona Shaw

Coordinates	49°46′59″N18°25′22″N
name	Richard Burton
birth name	Richard Walter Jenkins
birth date	November 10, 1925
birth place	Pontrhydyfen, Wales
death date	August 05, 1984
death place	Céligny, Switzerland
death cause	Cerebral haemorrhage
occupation	Actor
nationality	Welsh
years active	1944–84
spouse	Sybil Williams (1949–63; divorced)Elizabeth Taylor (1964–74, 1975–76; divorced)Suzy Hunt (1976–82; divorced)Sally Hay (1983–84; his death)
Children	Kate BurtonJessica BurtonLiza Todd BurtonMaria Burton }}

Richard Burton, CBE (10 November 1925 5 August 1984) was a Welsh actor. He was nominated seven times for an Academy Award, six of which were for Best Actor in a Leading Role (without ever winning), and was a recipient of BAFTA, Golden Globe and Tony Awards for Best Actor. Although never trained as an actor, Burton was, at one time, the highest-paid actor in Hollywood. He remains closely associated in the public consciousness with his second wife, actress Elizabeth Taylor; the couple's turbulent relationship was rarely out of the news.

Childhood and education

Richard Burton was born Richard Walter Jenkins in the village of Pontrhydyfen, Neath Port Talbot, Wales. He grew up in a working class, Welsh-speaking household, the twelfth of thirteen children. His father, Richard Walter Jenkins, was a short, robust coal miner, a "twelve-pints-a-day man" who sometimes went off on drinking and gambling sprees for weeks. Burton later claimed, by family telling, that "He looked very much like me...That is, he was pockmarked, devious, and smiled a great deal when he was in trouble. He was, also, a man of extraordinary eloquence, tremendous passion, great violence."

Burton was less than two years old in 1927 when his mother, Edith Maude (née Thomas), died at the age of 43 after giving birth to her 13th child. His sister Cecilia and her husband Elfed took him into their Presbyterian mining family in nearby Port Talbot (an English-speaking steel town). Burton said later that his sister became "more mother to me than any mother could have ever been... I was immensely proud of her... she felt all tragedies except her own". Burton's father would occasionally visit the homes of his grown daughters but was otherwise absent. Also important in young Burton's life was Ifor (Ivor), the brother 19 years his senior. A miner and rugby player, Ifor "ruled the household with the proverbial firm hand".

Burton showed a talent for English and Welsh literature at grammar school, and demonstrated an excellent memory, though his consuming interest was sports – rugby (in fact famous Welsh centre Bleddyn Williams said in his autobiography that Burton could have gone far as a player), cricket, and table tennis He later said, "I would rather have played for Wales at Cardiff Arms Park than Hamlet at the Old Vic." He earned pocket money by running messages, hauling horse manure, and delivering newspapers. He started to smoke at the age of eight and drink regularly at twelve. Inspired by his schoolmaster, Philip H. Burton, he excelled in school productions, his first being ''The Apple Cart''. Philip could not legally adopt Burton because their age difference was one year short of the minimum twenty years required. Burton early on displayed an excellent speaking and singing voice and won an Eisteddfod prize as a boy soprano.

Burton left school at sixteen for full-time work. He worked for the local wartime Co-operative committee, handing out supplies in exchange for coupons, but then considered other professions for his future, including boxing, religion and singing. When Burton joined the Port Talbot Squadron of the Air Training Corps as a cadet, he re-encountered Philip Burton, his former teacher, who was the commander. Richard also joined a youth drama group led by Leo Lloyd, a steel worker and avid amateur thespian, who taught him the fundamentals of acting.

Philip Burton, recognising Richard's talent, then adopted him as his ward and Richard returned to school, and, being older than most of the boys, he was very attractive to some of the girls. Philip Burton later said, "Richard was my son to all intents and purposes. I was committed to him." Philip Burton tutored his charge intensely in school subjects and also worked at developing the youth's acting voice, including outdoor voice drills which improved his projection.

In 1943, at the age of eighteen, Richard Burton (who had now taken his teacher's surname but would not change it by deed poll for several years), was allowed into Exeter College, Oxford for a special term of six months study, made possible because he was an air force cadet obligated to later military service. He subsequently did serve in the RAF (1944–1947) as a navigator. Burton's eyesight was too poor for him to be considered pilot material.

Early acting career

In the 1940s and early 1950s Burton worked on stage and in cinema in the United Kingdom. Before his war service with the Royal Air Force, he starred as Professor Higgins in a YMCA production of ''Pygmalion''. He earned his first professional acting fees doing radio parts for the BBC. He had made his professional acting debut in Liverpool and London, appearing in ''Druid's Rest'', a play by Emlyn Williams (who also became a guru), but his career was interrupted by conscription in 1944. Early on as an actor, he developed the habit of toting around a book-bag filled with novels, dictionaries, a complete Shakespeare, and books of quotations, history, and biography, and enjoyed solving crossword puzzles. Burton could, given any line from Shakespeare's works, recite from memory the next several minutes of lines. His Welsh love of language was paramount, as he famously stated years later, with a tearful Elizabeth Taylor at his side, "The only thing in life is language. Not love. Not anything else."

In 1947, after his discharge from the RAF, Burton went to London to seek his fortune. He immediately signed up with a theatrical agency to make himself available for casting calls. His first film was ''The Last Days of Dolwyn'', set in a Welsh village about to be drowned to provide a reservoir. His reviews praised him for his "acting fire, manly bearing, and good looks."

Burton met his future wife, the young actress Sybil Williams, on the set, and they married in February 1949. They had two daughters, and divorced in 1963 after Burton's widely reported affair with Elizabeth Taylor. In the years of his marriage to Sybil, Burton appeared in the West End in a highly successful production of ''The Lady's Not for Burning'', alongside Sir John Gielgud and Claire Bloom, in both the London and NewYork productions. He had small parts in various British films: ''Now Barabbas Was A Robber''; ''Waterfront'' (1950) with Robert Newton; ''The Woman with No Name'' (1951); and a bigger part as a smuggler in ''Green Grow the Rushes'', a B-movie.

Reviewers took notice of Burton: "He has all the qualifications of a leading man that the British film industry so badly needs at this juncture: youth, good looks, a photogenic face, obviously alert intelligence, and a trick of getting the maximum of attention with a minimum of fuss." In the 1951 season at Stratford, he gave a critically acclaimed performance and achieved stardom as Prince Hal in Shakespeare's ''Henry IV, Part 1'' opposite Anthony Quayle's Falstaff. Philip Burton arrived at Stratford to help coach his former charge, and he noted in his memoir that Quayle and Richard Burton had their differences about the interpretation of the Prince Hal role. Richard Burton was already demonstrating the same independence and competitiveness as an actor that he displayed off-stage in drinking, sport, or story-telling.

Kenneth Tynan said of Burton's performance, "His playing of Prince Hal turned interested speculation to awe almost as soon as he started to speak; in the first intermission local critics stood agape in the lobbies." Suddenly, Richard Burton had fulfilled his guardian's wildest hopes and was admitted to the post-War British acting circle which included Anthony Quayle, John Gielgud, Michael Redgrave, Hugh Griffith and Paul Scofield. He even met Humphrey Bogart, a fellow hard drinker, who sang his praises back in Hollywood. Lauren Bacall recalled, "Bogie loved him. We all did. You had no alternative." Burton bought the first of many cars and celebrated by increasing his drinking. The following year, Burton signed a five-year contract with Alexander Korda at £100 a week, launching his Hollywood career.

Hollywood and later career

In 1952, Burton successfully made the transition to a Hollywood star; on the recommendation of Daphne du Maurier, he was given the leading role in ''My Cousin Rachel'' opposite Olivia de Havilland. Burton arrived on the Hollywood scene at a time when the studios were struggling. Television's rise was drawing away viewers and the studios looked to new stars and new film technology to staunch the bleeding. 20th Century Fox negotiated with Korda to borrow him for this film and a further two at $50,000 a film. The film was a critical success. It established Burton as a Hollywood leading man and earned him his first Academy Award nomination and the Golden Globe Award for New Star of the Year – Actor. In ''Desert Rats'' (1953), Burton plays a young English captain in the North African campaign during World War II who takes charge of a hopelessly out-numbered Australian unit against the indomitable Field Marshal Erwin Rommel (James Mason). Mason, another actor known for his distinctive voice and excellent elocution, became a friend of Burton's and introduced the new actor to the Hollywood crowd. In short order, he met Judy Garland, Greta Garbo, Stewart Granger, Jean Simmons, Deborah Kerr, and Cole Porter, and Burton met up again with Humphrey Bogart. At a party, he met a pregnant Elizabeth Taylor (then married to Michael Wilding) whose first impression of Burton was that "he was rather full of himself. I seem to remember that he never stopped talking, and I had given him the cold fish eye."

The following year he created a sensation by starring in ''The Robe,'' the first film to premiere in the wide-screen process CinemaScope, winning another Oscar nomination. He replaced Tyrone Power, who was originally cast in the role of Marcellus, a noble but decadent Roman in command of the detachment of Roman soldiers that crucified Jesus Christ, who, haunted by his guilt from this act, is eventually led to his own conversion. Marcellus' Greek slave (played by Victor Mature) guides him as a spiritual teacher, and his wife (played by Jean Simmons) follows his lead, although it will mean both their deaths. The film marked a resurgence in Biblical blockbusters. Burton was offered a seven-year, $1 million contract by Darryl F. Zanuck at Fox, but he turned it down, though later the contract was revived and he agreed to it. It has been suggested that remarks Burton made about blacklisting Hollywood while filming ''The Robe'' may have explained his failure to ever win an Oscar, despite receiving seven nominations.

In 1954, Burton took his most famous radio role, as the narrator in the original production of Dylan Thomas' ''Under Milk Wood'', a role he would reprise in the film version twenty years later. He was also the narrator, as Winston Churchill, in the highly successful 1960 television documentary series ''The Valiant Years.''

Stage career

Burton was still juggling theatre with film, playing Hamlet and Coriolanus at the Old Vic theatre in 1953 and alternating the roles of Iago and Othello with the Old Vic's other rising matinee idol John Neville. Hamlet was a challenge that both terrified and attracted him, as it was a role many of his peers in the British theatre had undertaken, including John Gielgud and Laurence Olivier. Bogart, on the other hand, warned him as Burton left Hollywood, "I never knew a man who played Hamlet who didn't die broke." Once again, Philip Burton provided expert coaching. Claire Bloom played Ophelia, and their work together led to a turbulent affair. His reviews in ''Hamlet'' were good but he received stronger praise for Coriolanus. His fellow actor, Robert Hardy, said, "His Coriolanus is quite easily the best I've ever seen" but Hamlet was "too strong".

Burton appeared on Broadway, receiving a Tony Award nomination for ''Time Remembered'' (1958) and winning the award for playing King Arthur in the musical ''Camelot'' (1960). Moss Hart directed the musical, written by Alan Jay Lerner and Frederick Loewe, which was originally called ''Jenny Kissed Me'', and based on T. H. White's ''The Once and Future King''. Julie Andrews, fresh from her triumph in ''My Fair Lady,'' played Guenevere to Burton's King Arthur, with Robert Goulet as Lancelot completing the love triangle. The production was troubled, with both Loewe and Hart falling ill, numerous revisions upsetting the schedule and the actors, and the pressure building due to great expectations and huge advance sales. The show's running time was nearly five hours. Burton took it all in his stride and calmed people down with statements like "Don't worry, love." Burton's intense preparation and competitive desire served him well. He was generous and supportive to others who were suffering in the maelstrom. According to Lerner, "he kept the boat from rocking, and ''Camelot'' might never have reached New York if it hadn't been for him." As in the play, both male stars were enamoured of their leading lady, newly married Andrews. When Goulet turned to Burton for advice, Burton had none to offer, but later he admitted, "I tried everything on her myself. I couldn't get anywhere either." Burton's reviews were excellent, ''Time'' magazine stated that Burton "gives Arthur the skilful and vastly appealing performance that might be expected from one of England's finest young actors." The show's album was a major seller. The Kennedys, newly in the White House, also enjoyed the play and invited Burton for a visit, establishing the link of the idealistic young Kennedy administration with Camelot.

He then put his stage career on the back burner to concentrate on film, although he received a third Tony Award nomination when he reprised his Hamlet under John Gielgud's direction in 1964 in a production that holds the record for the longest run of the play in Broadway history (136 performances). The performance was immortalised both on record and on a film that played in US theatres for a week in 1964 as well as being the subject of books written by cast members William Redfield and Richard L. Sterne. Burton took the role on just after his marriage to Taylor. Since Burton disliked wearing period clothing, Gielgud conceived a production in a "rehearsal" setting with a half-finished set and actors wearing their street clothes (carefully selected while the production really was in rehearsal). Burton's basic reading of Hamlet, which displeased some theatre-goers, was of a complex manic-depressive personality, but during the long run he varied his performance considerably as a self-challenge and to keep his acting fresh. On the whole, Burton had good reviews. ''Time'' said that Burton "put his passion into Hamlet's language rather than the character. His acting is a technician's marvel. His voice has gem-cutting precision." The opening night party was a lavish affair, attended by six hundred celebrities who paid homage to the couple. The most successful aspect of the production was generally considered to be Hume Cronyn's performance as Polonius, winning Cronyn the only Tony Award that he would ever receive in a competitive category.

After his ''Hamlet,'' Burton did not return to the stage for twelve years until 1976 in ''Equus''. (He did however accept the role of Humbert Humbert in Alan Jay Lerner's musical adaptation of ''Lolita'' entitled ''Lolita, My Love''. However he withdrew and was replaced by friend and fellow Welshman John Neville.) His performance as psychiatrist Martin Dysart won him both a special Tony Award for his appearance, but he had to make ''Exorcist II: The Heretic'' – a film he hated – before Hollywood producers would allow him to repeat his role in the 1977 film version. Burton made only two more stage appearances after that, in a high-paying touring production of ''Camelot'' in 1980 that he was forced to leave early in the run after he was hospitalised and his entire spinal column was found to be coated with crystallised alcohol, necessitating immediate spinal surgery in which his backbone had to be completely rebuilt. Had the operation gone wrong he would have been left paralysed. He was replaced by his friend Richard Harris. The final stage performance in which he starred was a critically reviled production of Noël Coward's ''Private Lives,'' opposite his ex-wife Elizabeth Taylor, in 1983. Most reviewers dismissed the production as a transparent attempt to capitalise on the couple's celebrity, although they grudgingly praised Burton as having the closest connection to Coward's play of anyone in the cast.

Hollywood career in the 1950s and 1960s

In terms of critical success, Burton's Hollywood roles throughout the 1950s did not live up to the early promise of his debut. Burton returned to Hollywood to star in ''The Prince of Players'', another historical Cinemascope film, this time concerning Edwin Booth, famous American actor and brother of Abraham Lincoln's assassin John Wilkes Booth. A weak script undermined a valiant effort by Burton, although the view of director, Philip Dunne, was that "The fire and intensity were there, but that was all. He hadn't yet mastered the tricks of the great movie stars, such as Gary Cooper." Next came ''Alexander The Great'' (1956), written, directed, and produced by Robert Rossen (Academy Award winner for ''All the King's Men''), with Burton in the title role, on a loan out to United Artists, and again with Claire Bloom co-starring. Contrary to Burton's expectations, the "intelligent epic" was a wooden, slow-paced flop.

In ''The Rains of Ranchipur'', Burton plays a noble Hindu doctor who attempts the spiritual recovery of an adulteress (Lana Turner). Critics felt that the film lacked star chemistry, with Burton having difficulty with the accent, and relied too heavily on Cinemascope special effects including an earthquake and a collapsing dam. Burton returned to the theatre in ''Henry V'' and ''Othello'', alternating the roles of Iago and Othello. He and Sybil then moved to Switzerland to avoid high British taxes and to try to build a nest egg, for themselves and for Burton's family. He returned to film again in ''Sea Wife'', shot in Jamaica and directed by Roberto Rossellini. A young Joan Collins (then called by the tabloids "Britain's bad girl") plays a nun shipwrecked on an island with three men. But Rossellini was let go after disagreements with Zanuck. According to Collins, Burton had a "take-the-money-and-run attitude" toward the film. Burton turned down the lead for ''Lawrence of Arabia'', also turned down by Marlon Brando, which went to newcomer Peter O'Toole, who produced a memorable performance in the multi-Oscar-winning film.

Then in 1958, he was offered the part of Jimmy Porter, "an angry young man" role, in the film version of John Osborne's play ''Look Back in Anger'', a gritty drama about middle-class life in the British Midlands, directed by Tony Richardson, and again with Claire Bloom as co-star. Though it didn't do well commercially (many critics felt Burton, at 33, looked too old for the part) and Burton's Hollywood box office aura seemed to be diminishing, Burton was proud of the effort and wrote to his mentor Philip Burton, "I promise you that there isn't a shred of self-pity in my performance. I am for the first time ever looking forward to seeing a film in which I play". Next came ''The Bramble Bush'' and ''Ice Palace'' in 1960, neither important to Burton's career.

After playing King Arthur in ''Camelot'' on Broadway for six months, Burton replaced Stephen Boyd as Mark Antony in the troubled production ''Cleopatra'' (1963). Twentieth Century-Fox's future appeared to hinge on what became the most expensive movie ever made up until then, reaching almost $40 million. The film proved to be the start of Burton's most successful period in Hollywood; he would remain among the top 10 box-office earners for the next four years. During the filming, Burton met and fell in love with Elizabeth Taylor, who was married to Eddie Fisher. The two would not be free to marry until 1964 when their respective divorces were complete. On their first meeting on the set, Burton said "Has anyone ever told you that you're a very pretty girl?" Taylor later recalled, "I said to myself, ''Oy gevalt'', here's the great lover, the great wit, the great intellectual of Wales, and he comes out with a line like that." In their first scenes together, he was shaky and missing his lines, and she soothed and coached him. Soon the affair began in earnest and Sybil, seeing this as more than a passing fling with a leading lady, was unable to bear it. She fled the set, first for Switzerland, then for London.

The gigantic scale of the troubled production, Taylor's bouts of illness and fluctuating weight, the off-screen turbulence—all generated enormous publicity, which by-and-large the studio embraced. Zanuck stated, "I think the Taylor-Burton association is quite constructive for our organization." The six-hour film was cut to under four, eliminating many of Burton's scenes, but the result was viewed the same—a film long on spectacle dominated by the two hottest stars in Hollywood. Their private lives turned out to be an endless source of curiosity for the media, and their marriage was also the start of a series of on-screen collaborations. In the end, the film did well enough to recoup its great cost.

Burton played Taylor's tycoon husband in ''The V.I.P.s'', an all-star film set in the VIP lounge of London Airport which proved to be a box-office hit. Then Burton portrayed the archbishop martyred by Henry II in the title role of ''Becket'', turning in an effective, restrained performance, contrasting with Peter O'Toole's manic portrayal of Henry.

In 1964, Burton triumphed as defrocked Episcopal priest Dr. T. Lawrence Shannon in Tennessee Williams' ''The Night of the Iguana'' directed by John Huston, a film which became another critical and box office success. Richard Burton's performance in ''The Night of the Iguana'' may be his finest hour on the screen, and in the process helped put the town of Puerto Vallarta on the map (the Burtons later bought a house there). Part of Burton's success was due to how well he varied his acting with the three female characters, each of whom he tries to seduce differently: Ava Gardner (the randy hotel owner), Sue Lyon (the nubile American tourist), and Deborah Kerr (the poor, repressed artist).

Against his family's advice, Burton married Taylor on Sunday 15 March 1964 in Montreal. Ever optimistic, Taylor proclaimed, "I'm so happy you can't believe it. This marriage will last forever". At the hotel in Boston, the rabid crowd clawed at the newlyweds, Burton's coat was ripped and Taylor's ear was bloodied when someone tried to steal one of her earrings.

After an interruption playing ''Hamlet'' on Broadway, Burton returned to film as British spy Alec Leamas in ''The Spy Who Came in from the Cold''. Burton and Taylor continued making films together though the next one ''The Sandpiper'' (1965) was poorly received. Following that, he and Taylor had a great success in Mike Nichols's film (1966) of the Edward Albee play ''Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf?'', in which a bitter erudite couple spend the evening trading vicious barbs in front of their horrified and fascinated guests, played by George Segal and Sandy Dennis. Burton was not the first choice for the role of Taylor's husband. Jack Lemmon was offered the role first, but when he backed off, Jack Warner, with Taylor's insistence, agreed on Burton and paid him his price. Albee preferred Bette Davis and James Mason, fearing that the Burtons' strong screen presence would dominate the film. Nichols, in his directorial debut, managed the Burtons brilliantly. The script by Hollywood veteran Ernest Lehman broke new ground for its raw language and harsh depiction of marriage. Although all four actors received Oscar nominations for their roles in the film (the film received a total of thirteen), only Taylor and Dennis went on to win. So immersed had the Burtons become in the roles of George and Martha over the months of shooting, after the wrap Richard Burton said, "I feel rather lost." Later the couple would state that the film took its toll on their relationship, and that Taylor was "tired of playing Martha" in real life.

Their lively version of Shakespeare's ''The Taming of the Shrew'' (1967), directed by Franco Zeffirelli, was a notable success. Later collaborations, however, ''The Comedians'' (1967), ''Boom!'' (1968), and the Burton-directed ''Doctor Faustus'' (1967) (which had its genesis from a theatre production he staged and starred in at the Oxford University Dramatic Society) were critical and commercial failures. He did enjoy a final commercial blockbuster with Clint Eastwood in ''Where Eagles Dare'' in 1968 but his last film of the decade, ''Anne of the Thousand Days'' (1969), was a commercial and critical disappointment. In spite of those failures, it performed remarkably well at that year's Academy awards (receiving ten nominations, including one for Burton's performance as Henry VIII), which many thought to be largely the result of an expensive advertising campaign by Universal Studios.

Later career

Due to Burton and Taylor's extravagant spending and his support of his family and others (42 people at one point), Burton agreed to work in mediocre films that hurt his career. He recognised his financial need to do so, and that in the New Hollywood era of cinema he or Taylor would not soon again be paid as well as at the height of their stardom. Films he made during this period included ''Bluebeard'' (1972), ''Hammersmith Is Out'' (1972), ''The Klansman'' (1974), and ''Exorcist II: The Heretic'' (1977). He did enjoy one major critical success in the 1970s in the film version of his stage hit ''Equus'', winning the Golden Globe Award as well as an Academy Award nomination. Public sentiment towards his perennial frustration at not winning an Oscar made many pundits consider him the favourite to finally win the award, but on Oscar Night he lost to Richard Dreyfuss in ''The Goodbye Girl''.

In 1976 Burton received a Grammy in the category of Best Recording for Children for his narration of ''The Little Prince'' by Antoine de Saint-Exupéry. He also found success in 1978, when he narrated ''Jeff Wayne's Musical Version of The War of the Worlds''. His distinctive performance became a necessary part of the concept album – so much so that a hologram of Burton is used to narrate the live stage show (touring in 2006, 2007, 2009 and 2010) of the musical.

Burton had an international box office hit with ''The Wild Geese'' (1978), an adventure tale about mercenaries in Africa. The film was a success in the UK and Europe but had only limited distribution in the U.S. owing to the collapse of the studio that funded it and the lack of an American star in the movie. He returned to appearing in critically reviled films like ''The Medusa Touch'' (1978), ''Circle of Two'' (1980), and ''Wagner'' (1983), a role he said he was born to play, after his success in ''Equus''. His last film performance, as O'Brien in ''Nineteen Eighty-Four'', was critically acclaimed.

At the time of his death, Burton was preparing to film ''Wild Geese II'', the sequel to ''The Wild Geese'', which was eventually released in 1985. Burton was to reprise the role of Colonel Faulkner, while his friend Sir Laurence Olivier was cast as Rudolf Hess. After his death, Burton was replaced by Edward Fox, and the character changed to Faulkner's younger brother.

Oscars

He was nominated six times for an Academy Award for Best Actor and once for an Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor – but he never won. From 1982, he and ''Becket'' co-star Peter O'Toole shared the record for the male actor with the most nominations (7) for a competitive acting Oscar without ever winning. In 2007, O'Toole was nominated for an eighth time (and subsequently lost), for ''Venus'' (however, O'Toole received an Academy Honorary Award in 2003).

Television

Burton rarely appeared on television, although he gave a memorable performance as Caliban in a televised production of ''The Tempest'' for The Hallmark Hall of Fame in 1960. Later appearances included the television film ''Divorce His – Divorce Hers'' (1973) opposite then-wife Elizabeth Taylor (a prophetic title, since their first marriage would be dissolved less than a year later), a remake of the classic film ''Brief Encounter'' (1974) that was considered vastly inferior to the 1945 original, and a critically applauded performance as Winston Churchill in ''The Gathering Storm'' (1974). A critically panned film he made about the life of Richard Wagner (noted only for having the only onscreen teaming of Laurence Olivier, John Gielgud and Ralph Richardson in the same scene) was shown as a television miniseries in 1983 after failing to achieve a theatrical release in most countries, but Burton enjoyed a personal triumph in the American television miniseries ''Ellis Island'' in 1984, receiving a posthumous Emmy Award nomination for his final television performance.

Television played an important part in the fate of his Broadway appearance in ''Camelot.'' When the show's run was threatened by disappointing reviews, Burton and co-star Julie Andrews appeared on ''The Ed Sullivan Show'' to perform the number ''What Do The Simple Folk Do?''. The television appearance renewed public interest in the production and extended its Broadway run.

Burton showed a subtle flair for comedy in a 1970 guest appearance with Elizabeth Taylor on the sitcom ''Here's Lucy'', where he recited, in a plumber's uniform, a haunting excerpt of a speech from Shakespeare's Richard II. He later parodied this role in an episode of Television Show ''The Fall Guy''.

In 1997, archive footage of Burton was used in the first episode of the television series ''Conan.''

Book

In 1964, Burton wrote a semi-autobiographical book ''A Christmas Story'', which is an endearing tale of a Christmas Eve in a Welsh mining village, during the Depression.

Personal life

Burton was married five times and he had four children. From 1949 until their divorce in 1963, he was married to producer Sybil Williams, by whom he had two daughters, Katherine "Kate" Burton (born 10 September 1957) and Jessica Burton (born 1961). He was married twice, consecutively, to actress Elizabeth Taylor, from 15 March 1964 to 26 June 1974 and from 10 October 1975 to 29 July 1976. Their first wedding took place in Montreal, and their second wedding occurred, 16 months after their divorce, in the Chobe National Park in Botswana. In 1964, the couple adopted a daughter from Germany, Maria Burton (born 1 August 1961). Burton also adopted Taylor's daughter by the late producer Mike Todd, Elizabeth Frances "Liza" Todd Burton (born 6 August 1957). Their relationship as portrayed in ''Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf?'' was popularly likened to Burton and Taylor's real-life marriage. Burton disagreed with others about Taylor's famed beauty, saying that calling her "the most beautiful woman in the world is absolute nonsense. She has wonderful eyes, but she has a double chin and an overdeveloped chest, and she’s rather short in the leg." In August 1976, a month after his second divorce from Taylor, Burton married model Susan Hunt, the former wife of Formula 1 Champion James Hunt; the marriage ended in divorce in 1982. From 1983 until his death in 1984, Burton was married to make-up artist Sally Hay.

In 1957 Burton became a tax exile by moving to Switzerland, where he lived until his death. It is widely believed he was never offered a knighthood due to his tax exile status, together with his attacks on Churchill and other controversial public opinions.

In 1968 Burton's elder brother, Ifor, slipped and fell, breaking his neck, after a lengthy drinking session with Burton at the actor's second home in Céligny, Switzerland. The injury left him paralysed from the neck down. His younger brother Graham Jenkins opined it may have been guilt over this that caused Burton to start drinking very heavily, particularly after Ifor died in 1973.

In a February 1975 interview with his friend David Lewin he said he "tried" homosexuality. He also suggested that perhaps all actors were latent homosexuals, and "we cover it up with drink". In 2000, Ellis Amburn's biography of Elizabeth Taylor suggested that Burton had an affair with Laurence Olivier and tried to seduce Eddie Fisher, although this was strongly denied by Burton's younger brother Graham Jenkins.

Burton was notorious for his unrestrained pursuit of women while filming. Joan Collins wrote that when she rejected his on-set advances, he embarked on a series of liaisons with other women including an elderly black maid who, according to Collins, was "almost toothless". Collins playfully told Burton that she believed he would sleep with a snake if he had the chance, to which Burton is alleged to have replied "only if it was wearing a skirt, darling".

He was an insomniac and a notoriously heavy drinker. However, ongoing back pain and a dependence upon pain medications have been suggested as the true cause of his misery. He was also a heavy smoker from the time he was just eight years old; and by his own admission in a December 1977 interview with Sir Ludovic Kennedy, Burton was smoking 60–100 cigarettes per day. According to his younger brother Graham Jenkins's 1988 book "Richard Burton: My Brother", he smoked at least a hundred cigarettes a day.

His father, also a heavy drinker, refused to acknowledge his son's talents, achievements and acclaim. In turn, Burton declined to attend his funeral, in 1957. Like Burton, his father died from a cerebral haemorrhage, in January 1957, at the age of 81.

Burton admired and was inspired by the actor and dramatist Emlyn Williams. He employed his son Brook Williams as his personal assistant and adviser and he was given small roles in some of the films in which Burton starred.

Burton was banned permanently from BBC productions in November 1974 for writing two newspaper articles questioning the sanity of Winston Churchill and others in power during World War II – Burton reported hating them "virulently" for the alleged promise to wipe out all Japanese people on the planet. The publication of these articles coincided with what would have been Churchill's centenary, and came after Burton had played him in a favourable light in ''A Walk with Destiny'', with considerable help from the Churchill family. In one article he accused Churchill of having Welsh miners shot during strikes in the 1920s. Ironically, Burton got along well with Churchill when he met him at a play in London, and kept a bust of him on his mantelpiece. On the Parkinson show in November 1974 Burton told a funny story about meeting Churchill; however, according to Robert Hardy, it was not true. Politically Burton was a lifelong socialist, although he was never as heavily involved in politics as his close friend Stanley Baker. He greatly admired Democratic Senator Robert F. Kennedy and once got into a sonnet-quoting contest with him. In 1973 Burton agreed to play Josef Broz Tito in a biopic, since he greatly admired the Yugoslav leader. While filming in Yugoslavia he publicly proclaimed that he was a communist, saying he felt no contradiction between earning vast sums of money for films and holding very left-wing views since "unlike capitalists, I don't exploit other people." Burton courted further controversy in 1976 when he wrote a controversial article about his friend and fellow Welsh thespian Stanley Baker, who had recently died from pneumonia at the age of 48.

Health issues

The 1988 biography of Burton by Melvyn Bragg provides a detailed description of the many health issues that plagued Burton throughout his life. In his youth, Burton was a star athlete and well known for his athletic abilities and strength. By the age of 41 he had declined so far in health that his arms were by his own admission thin and weak. He suffered from bursitis, possibly aggravated by faulty treatment, arthritis, dermatitis, cirrhosis of the liver and kidneys, as well as developing, by his mid-forties, a pronounced limp. How much of this was due to his intake of alcohol is impossible to ascertain, according to Bragg, because of Burton's reluctance to be treated for alcohol addiction; however, in 1974, Burton spent six weeks in a clinic to recuperate from a period during which he had been drinking three bottles of vodka a day. He was also a regular smoker, with an intake of between three and five packs a day for most of his adult life. Health issues continued to plague him until his death of a stroke at the age of 58.

Death

Burton died at age 58 from a brain haemorrhage on 5 August 1984 at his home in Céligny, Switzerland, and is buried there. Although his death was sudden, his health had been declining for several years, and he suffered from a constant and severe pain in the neck. He had been warned that his liver was enlarged as early as March 1970, and had been diagnosed with cirrhosis of the liver and kidneys in April 1981. Burton was buried in a red suit, a tribute to his Welsh roots, and with a copy of Dylan Thomas' poems. He and Taylor had discussed being buried together; his widow Sally purchased the plot next to Burton's and erected a large headstone across both, likely to prevent Taylor from being buried there.

Awards and nominations

Academy Awards

;Nominations

1952 Best Supporting Actor, ''My Cousin Rachel'' (Anthony Quinn)

1953 Best Actor, ''The Robe'' (William Holden)

1964 Best Actor, ''Becket'' (Rex Harrison)

1965 Best Actor, ''The Spy Who Came in from the Cold'' (Lee Marvin)

1966 Best Actor, ''Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf?'' (Paul Scofield)

1969 Best Actor, ''Anne of the Thousand Days'' (John Wayne)

1977 Best Actor, ''Equus'' (Richard Dreyfuss)

BAFTA Awards

1966 Best Actor, ''Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf? / The Spy Who Came in from the Cold''

;Nominations

1959 Best Actor, ''Look Back in Anger''

1967 Best Actor, ''The Taming of the Shrew''

Emmy Awards

;Nominations

1985 Outstanding Supporting Actor in a Limited Series or a Special, ''Ellis Island''

Golden Globe Awards

1953 Most Promising Newcomer – Male, ''My Cousin Rachel''

1978 Best Actor – Motion Picture Drama, ''Equus''

;Nominations

1960 Best Actor – Motion Picture Drama, ''Look Back in Anger''

1965 Best Actor – Motion Picture Drama, ''Becket''

1967 Best Actor – Motion Picture Drama, ''Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf?''

1968 Best Actor – Motion Picture Musical/Comedy, ''The Taming of the Shrew''

1970 Best Actor – Motion Picture Drama, ''Anne of the Thousand Days''

Grammy Award Winner

1975 Best Children's Recording, The Little Prince

Tony Awards

1961 Best Actor – Musical, ''Camelot''

1976 Special Award

;Nominations

1959 Best Actor – Play, ''Time Remembered''

1964 Best Actor – Play, ''Hamlet''

Filmography

Stage productions

''Measure for Measure'' (1944)

''Druid's Rest'' (1944)

''Castle Anna'' (1948)

''The Lady's Not for Burning'' (1949)

''The Lady's Not for Burning'' (1950)

''A Phoenix Too Frequent'' (1950)

''The Boy With A Cart'' (1950)

''Legend of Lovers'' (1951)

''The Tempest'' (1951)

''Henry V'' (1951)

''Henry IV'' (1951)

''Montserrat'' (1952)

''The Tempest'' (1953)

''King John'' (1953)

''Hamlet'' (1953)

''Coriolanus'' (1953)

''Hamlet'' (1953)

''Twelfth Night'' (1953)

''Henry V'' (1955)

''Othello'' (1956)

''Sea Wife'' (1957)

''Time Remembered'' (1957)

''Camelot'' (1960)

''Hamlet'' (1964)

''A Poetry Reading'' (1964)

''Doctor Faustus'' (1966)

''Equus'' (1970)

''Camelot'' (1980)

''Private Lives'' (1983)

''War of the Worlds'' (1978)

Further reading

Shipman, D. ''The Great Movie Stars: The International Years'', Angus & Robertson 1982. ISBN 0-207-14803-1

References

External links

Official website of Richard Burton

Richard Burton's yacht Kalizma

Burton in the pub with his father and brother in Pontrhydyfen

Richard Burton on the Dick Cavett Show, July 1980

|- !colspan="3" style="background:#C1D8FF;"| Husband of Elizabeth Taylor

Category:1925 births Category:1984 deaths Category:Adoptees adopted by relations Category:Alcohol-related deaths in Switzerland Category:Alumni of Exeter College, Oxford Category:American Theatre Hall of Fame inductees Category:BAFTA winners (people) Category:Best British Actor BAFTA Award winners Category:Best Drama Actor Golden Globe (film) winners Category:British expatriates in Switzerland Category:Commanders of the Order of the British Empire Category:Deaths from cerebral hemorrhage Category:Grammy Award winners Category:People from Neath Port Talbot Category:People self-identifying as alcoholics Category:Royal Air Force personnel of World War II Category:Shakespearean actors Category:Tony Award winners Category:United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees Goodwill Ambassadors Category:Welsh film actors Category:Welsh-speaking people Category:Welsh stage actors Category:People educated at Glan Afan Comprehensive School

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