Contents
V. S. Naipaul
Writing A House for Mr Biswas and searching accounts of colonial and postcolonial life.
The Mystic Masseur · A House for Mr Biswas
- Born
- 17 August 1932
- Birthplace
- Chaguanas, Trinidad and Tobago
- Died
- 11 August 2018
More people
V. S. Naipaul
V. S. Naipaul was a Trinidad-born British writer whose fiction and travel books examined displacement and ambition.
Early life
Trinidad
Grew up in a family with roots in India.
Oxford
Left Trinidad on a scholarship to study in Britain.
Career
- 1950s
Broadcasting and fiction
Worked with the BBC’s Caribbean Voices and began publishing novels.
- 1961
International breakthrough
Reached wider readers with A House for Mr Biswas.
- 2001
Nobel Prize
Received the Nobel Prize in Literature.
Selected work
The Mystic Masseur
Satirised social ambition in Trinidad.
A House for Mr Biswas
Followed one man’s search for an independent home.
A Bend in the River
Depicted uncertainty in a postcolonial African state.
Beyond work
Travel
Extensive journeys informed his nonfiction.
Family influence
His father’s aspirations as a writer helped shape his own ambitions.
Sources & photo credit
Life, career and references ↗Nobel Prize biography and award ↗Photo: Faizul Latif Chowdhury. CC BY-SA 4.0 · Original image. Cropped and displayed in monochrome.
