Welch, Denton

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British artist and writer.

From the description of Denton Welch Papers, 1770-2002 (bulk 1938-1982). (Harry Ransom Humanities Research Center (HRC); University of Texas at Austin). WorldCat record id: 84699220

English author.

From the description of Autograph letters signed (4) : Sevenoaks, Kent, to The Reverend Richard Blake Brown, 1946-1947. (Unknown). WorldCat record id: 270872463

Epithet: author

British Library Archives and Manuscripts Catalogue : Person : Description : ark:/81055/vdc_100000000386.0x0001d8

Maurice Denton Welch was born to Rosalind and Arthur Joseph Welch in Shanghai on March 29, 1915, the youngest of four sons. The maternal and paternal sides of the family had for a considerable period been successfully involved in commercial ventures in China, and the Welch sons were raised in comfortable circumstances. In 1924 Denton was sent, like his elder brothers, to England for schooling. Following his mother’s death in 1927 the bright but eccentric youth struggled with his mother’s loss and a feeling of alienation at school, culminating in his running away from Repton School in 1931.

Following a year spent, at his father’s suggestion, in Shanghai, Denton Welch returned to England in 1933 and enrolled in the Goldsmith School of Art in London. Two years later injuries received when he was struck by an automobile terminated his scholastic career and led to medical complications to which he eventually succumbed. After his discharge from a nursing home at Broadstairs, Kent in 1936 Denton Welch moved with housekeeper Evelyn Sinclair to rural western Kent, where he lived for the remainder of his life.

In his Kentish retirement Welch continued to paint and draw and had his first exhibition at the Leicester Galleries in 1941. From the first years of World War II Denton Welch also began to pursue, with increasing success, a literary career, initially publishing poems in literary magazines during 1941 and maintaining a journal.

His Sickert at St. Paul’s, an account of Welch’s meeting with the artist Walter Sickert (1860-1942) during the early stages of his recuperation at Broadstairs, appeared in the August 1942 issue of Horizon, attracting (with Welch’s encouragement) the attention of Edith Sitwell. His autobiographical novel Maiden Voyage was accepted for publication by George Routledge and Sons, and, with Sitwell’s foreword and strong pre-publication review, was sold out before its May 1943 publication.

Welch’s arrival as a novelist during 1943 was followed by his introduction to Eric Oliver, who soon became his friend and life partner. As his health deteriorated in the mid-1940s Denton Welch worked as he was able to finish a second novel, In Youth Is Pleasure (1945), as well as to continue writing short stories, several of which were collected in Brave and Cruel and Other Stories (1949). His last novel, A Voice through a Cloud, was unfinished at his death on December 30, 1948, but eventually appeared in print in 1950.

From the guide to the Denton Welch Papers TXRC06-A26., 1770-2002 (bulk 1938-1982), (The University of Texas at Austin, Harry Ransom Humanities Research Center)

Relation Name
associatedWith Archer, David. person
associatedWith Archer, David. person
associatedWith Asquith, Margot, 1864-1945 person
associatedWith Bagnall, Stephen. person
associatedWith Bagnall, Stephen. person
associatedWith Berners, Gerald Hugh Tyrwhitt-Wilson, Baron, 1883-1950 person
associatedWith Bolitho, Hector, 1897-1974 person
associatedWith Brooke, Jocelyn. person
associatedWith Brooke, Jocelyn. person
associatedWith Brown, Richard Blake, person
associatedWith Cahoon, Herbert, 1918- person
associatedWith Colefax, Sibyl, 1874-1950 person
associatedWith Connolly, Barbara. person
associatedWith Connolly, Barbara. person
associatedWith Connolly, Cyril, 1903-1974 person
associatedWith Cranston, Maurice William, 1920- person
associatedWith De-la-Noy, Michael, 1934- person
associatedWith Goodman, Julian. person
associatedWith Goodman, Julian. person
associatedWith Hennell, Thomas, 1903-1945 person
associatedWith Lehmann, Rosamond, 1903-1976, person
associatedWith Moore, Henry, 1898-1986 person
associatedWith Newton, Richard. person
associatedWith Newton, Richard. person
associatedWith Nicolson, Harold George, Sir, 1886-1968 person
associatedWith Oliver, Eric. person
associatedWith Oliver, Eric. person
associatedWith Roberts, Denys Kilham, 1903-1976. person
associatedWith Sackville-West, Edward, Hon., 1901-1965 person
associatedWith Sackville-West, V. (Victoria), 1892-1962 person
associatedWith Sitwell, Edith, Dame, 1887-1964 person
associatedWith Sitwell, Osbert, 1892-1969 person
associatedWith Walbrand-Evans, May. person
associatedWith Walbrand-Evans, May. person
associatedWith Welch, Denton person
Place Name Admin Code Country
England
Subject
Artists
Artists
Authors, English
Occupation
Artists
Activity

Person

Birth 1915-03-29

Death 1948-12-30

Britons

English

Information

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SNAC ID: 1606403