Malcolm Lowry

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Clarence Malcolm Lowry (28 July 1909 – 26 June 1957) was an English poet and novelist best known for his 1947 book Under the Volcano, which was voted No. 1 by the European Parliament. The Modern Library 100 Best Novels list has 11 authors.

Early years in England

Lowry was born in New Brighton, Wirral, the fourth son of Evelyn Boden and Arthur Lowry, a Cumberland cotton broker with roots in Cumberland. The family migrated from Caldy, which was on another portion of the Wirral peninsula, in 1912. On two acres with a tennis court, a small golf course, and a maid, a cook, and a nanny. Lowry was said to have been left homeless by his mother, and he was nearest to his brother. At the age of 14, he began to drink alcohol.

Lowry was a boarder at The Leys School in Cambridge in his teens, and the school was made popular by the book Goodbye, Mr. Chips. He won the junior golf championship at the Royal Liverpool Golf Club in Hoylake at age 15. Malcolm's father expected him to go to Cambridge and work in the family business, but he wanted to travel the world and convince his father to let him work as a deckhand on a tramp steamer to the Far East. His parents led him to the Liverpool waterfront in May 1927, when the local press watched as he set sail on the freighter S.S. Pyrrhus. The five months on sea gave him stories to include in his first book, Ultramarine.

Lowry's parents were back to England in 1929, and he began attending St Catharine's College, Cambridge, in an attempt to please his parents. He spent little time at the university but excelled in writing, graduating in 1931 with a 3rd-class honours degree in English. Paul Fitte, his roommate, took his own life during his first term. Fitte wanted a gay relationship, but Lowry refused. Lowry attributed to his death and was haunted by it for the remainder of his life. Lowry was already travelled; between sailing and sailing, he went from America to befriend Conrad Aiken, and Germany; between sailing and sailing, he was also well traveled.

Lowry lived briefly in London, remaining on the fringes of the burgeoning Thirties literary scene and meeting Dylan Thomas. Jan Gabrial, his first wife, was born in Spain. They were married in France in 1934. Their marriage was tumultuous, particularly because of her alcohol use and because she resented homosexuals attracted to her husband.

Lowry came back to New York City in January after an alcohol-induced crash, where he checked into Bellevue Psychiatric Hospital in 1936, which later became the basis of his novella Lunar Caustic. As the police started to notice him, he flew to avoid deportation and then landed in Hollywood, where he attempted screenwriting. He began writing Under the Volcano about the same period. In a last effort to save their marriage, Lowry and Jan arrived in Mexico on November 2nd, 1936, the Day of the Dead. Even though Lowry devoted more time to his writing, he continued to drink heavily.

The attempt to save their marriage fell flat on the attempt. Jan found that he needed a mother figure, but that she did not want to mother him. In late 1937, she was reunited with another man. Alone in Oaxaca, Lowry, went through another period of sour alcohol abuse, culminating in his removal from Mexico in 1938. His family brought him up in Los Angeles, where he began writing his book and met his second wife, actress and writer Margerie Bonner, as he continued to work on his novel. His father mailed his rent checks directly to the Normandie's hotel manager.

Lowry left his manuscript behind in August as he travelled to Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada. Margerie moved to Vancouver later that year, carrying his manuscript, and the couple married the following year. They were first housekeepers in a tiny apartment in the city. Lowry attempted to enlist but was refused as World War II broke out. Lowry and Canada's Governor-General Lord Tweedsmuir (who was more well known as the writer John Buchan) during this period resulted in Lowry's writing numerous articles for the Vancouver Province newspaper. The couple lived and wrote in a squatter's shack on the beach in British Columbia, north of Vancouver. Lowry was killed in his attempts to save manuscripts in 1944, when the beach shack was destroyed by a fire. Margerie was a person of great influence, editing Lowry's work skillfully and making sure he ate as well as drank (she drank, too). The couple lived in Europe, America, and the Caribbean, and although Lowry continued to drink heavily, this seems to have been a relatively stable and productive period. It didn't last until 1954, when a new nomadic period began, embracing New York, London, and other places. Lowry twice attempted to strangle Margerie on their travels to Europe.

He lived in Canada for a large part of his writing career and is thus considered a major figure in Canadian literature. In 1961, he received the Governor General's Award for English-language fiction, Hear Us O Lord of Heaven Thy Dwelling Place.

Lowry died in June 1957 in a rented cottage in Ripe, Sussex, where he and wife Margerie were living together after returning to England in 1955, sick and impoverished. The coroner's decision was death by misadventure, and the causes of death were identified as inhalation of stomach contents, barbiturate poisoning, and heavy consumption of alcohol.

His death has been interpreted as a suicide, according to reports. Inconsistencies in his wife's accounts regarding the events on the night of his death have also fueled suspicions of murder.

Lowry is buried in Ripe's churchyard, St John the Baptist. Lowry was reputed to write his own epitaph: "Here lies Malcolm Lowry, late of the Bowery, whose prose was flowery and often glows. "He lived nightly and drank regularly, and died playing the ukulele," the epitaph did not appear on his tombstone.

Malcolm Lowry's papers were purchased by the British Library in 2017 by his first wife, Jan Gabrial. Lowry's literary journals had been left in the custody of Gabrial's mother, Emily Vanderheim, in 1936 and then moved to Gabrial after she mother's death. Priscilla Bonner, the sister of Margerie Bonner Lowry, later acquired some more items from her. Lowry's literary papers; personal papers of Jan Gabrial; and selected items relating to Margerie Bonner Lowry, Lowry's second wife.

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