"The world's made up of individuals who don't want to be heroes." -- Brian Moore
Brian Moore (Christian name pronounced Bree-arn) (25 August 1921 – 11 January 1999) was a Northern Irish and Canadian novelist. He was acclaimed for his descriptions of life in Northern Ireland after the Second World War, in particular his explorations of the intercommunal divisions of The Troubles. Moore was also admired for his insight into female psychology, with women as the central narrative character in several of his books.
Moore was awarded the James Tait Black Memorial Prize in 1975 and the inaugural Sunday Express Book of the Year award in 1987, and was shortlisted for the Booker Prize three times. Moore also wrote screenplays and several of his books were made into films.
"After a goalless first half, the score at half time is 0-0.""And now we have the formalities over, we'll have the National Anthems.""As always on this boulevard, the faces were young, coming annually in an endless migration from every country, every continent, to alight here once in the long journey of their lives.""If misery loves company, then triumph demands an audience.""The silent majority distrusts people who believe in causes.""There comes a point in many people's lives when they can no longer play the role they have chosen for themselves. When that happens, we are like actors finding that someone has changed the play.""When you're a writer you no longer see things with the freshness of the normal person. There are always two figures that work inside you."
Moore was born and grew up in Belfast, Northern Ireland. His father was a pro-Axis surgeon and his mother was a nurse. He grew up in a large Roman Catholic family of nine children, but rejected that faith early in life. Some of his novels feature staunchly anti-doctrinaire and anti-clerical themes, and he in particular spoke strongly about the effect of the Church on life in Ireland. A recurring theme in his novels is the concept of the Catholic priesthood. On several occasions he explores the idea of a priest losing his faith. These works were criticized by his sister, a Roman Catholic nun.
Moore was a volunteer air raid warden during the bombing of Belfast by the Luftwaffe. He also served as a civilian with the British army in North Africa, Italy and France. He went on to work in Eastern Europe after the war ended for the United Nations Relief and Rehabilitation Administration. Moore emigrated to Canada in 1948, worked as a reporter for the Montreal Gazette, and eventually became a citizen of Canada. While he eventually made his primary residence in the United States, he continued to live part of each year in Canada up to his death. He also taught creative writing at UCLA.
Moore lived in Canada from 1948 to 1958, and wrote his first novels there. His earliest novels were thrillers, published under his own name and the pseudonyms Bernard Mara and Michael Bryan. Moore's first novel outside the genre, Judith Hearne, remains among his most highly regarded. The book was rejected by ten American publishers before being accepted by a British publisher. It was made into a film, with Dame Maggie Smith playing the lonely spinster who is the book/film's title character. Several other Moore novels were adapted for the screen, including Intent to Kill (1958), The Luck of Ginger Coffey, Catholics, Black Robe, Cold Heaven, and The Statement. He also wrote the screenplay for Alfred Hitchcock's Torn Curtain and The Blood of Others, based on the novel Le Sang des autres by Simone de Beauvoir.
Brian Moore died in 1999 at his home in Malibu, California, aged 77, of pulmonary fibrosis. He had been working on a novel about the 19th-century French symbolist poet Arthur Rimbaud. [1]
Moore has been the subject of two biographies, Brian Moore: The Chameleon Novelist (1998) by Denis Sampson and Brian Moore: A Biography (2002) by Patricia Craig. One of the first critical retrospectives of Moore's entire body of work can be found in Brian Moore and the Meaning of the Past (2007) by Patrick Hicks.
Information about the publishing of Moore's novel, Judith Hearne, and the break-up of his marriage can be found in Diana Athill's memoir, Stet (2000).
Moore's archives, which includes unfilmed screenplays, drafts of various novels, working notes, a 42-volume journal (1957-1998), and his correspondence, are now at The Harry Ransom Humanities Research Center, University of Texas. [2]
