Laurie Lee was a poet and novelist, best-known for his autobiographical
trilogy Cider with Rosie (1959), As I Walked Out One Midsummer Morning
(1969), and A Moment of War (1991). The trilogy depicts Lee's boyhood
in the country, his journey to London to seek his fortune, and his
experiences in the Spanish Civil War.
Laurie Lee was born in Stroud, Gloucestershire, where the pattern
of life had not changed in centuries. The families lived in overcrowded
cottages, cooked on wood-fires and went to bed by candlelight. Lee
was educated at the village school and at Stroud Central School.
When he was fifteen he left school and became an errand-boy. He
also gave lectures on the violin.
In his teens Lee had already began to write poems. He had met
two sisters who encouraged him in his writing aspirations. Both
sisters were passionately involved with him. At the age of twenty
Lee left for London, and worked for a year as a builder's labourer.
He then spent four years travelling in Spain and the eastern Mediterranean.
During these years he met a woman who took him under her wing and
sent him to university to study art. According to many biographical
sources, Lee fought in the Spanish Civil War (1936-39) in the Republican
army against Franco's Nationalists. However, there has been controversial
claims that Lee's involvement in the war was a fantasy.
Before devoting himself entirely to writing in 1951, Lee worked
as a journalist and as a scriptwriter. He made during World War
II documentary films for the General Post Office film unit (1939-40),
and the Crown Film Unit (1941-43). From 1944 to 1946 he worked as
an editor at the Ministry of Information publications, and from
1950 to 1951 he was caption-writer-in-chief for the Festival of
Britain, for which service he was awarded the MBE. In 1950 Lee married
Catherine Francesca Polge, a Provençal woman; they had one daughter.
Lee's first poem appeared in Horizon in 1940, and his first collection,
"The Sun My Monument", was published in 1944.
Lee's romantic poems show influence of Federico García Lorca. Several
poems written in the early 1940s reflect the atmosphere of the war,
but also capture impressions of the English countryside, birdsong
and the smell of apples and grass. With "A Rose for Winter"
(1955) Lee started his autobiographical production. It tells of
Lee's trip to Spain 15 years after his first visit, finding a country
ravaged by war, yet the people still exuding a vivacity of spirit
with flamenco dancing and bullfights. "Cider with Rosie"
(1959) focused with a series of sketches on the author's childhood
in Glouchestershire village of Slad. The book presented a variety
of memorable figures, among them Lee's mother. "As I Walked
Out One Midsummer Morning" narrates Lee's first trip to
the Civil War Spain in 1936 and his walk across the country from
Vigo to Granada. "Two Women" (1983) was an intimate
story of Lee's courtship of his wife Cathy, and the birth and growth
of their daughter Jessy. "A Moment of War" told
about a young man's walk over the Pyrenees into Spain to join the
International Brigades in 1937.
Lee also wrote travel books, essays, a radio play, short stories.
He received several awards, including Atlantic Award (1944), Society
of Authors travelling award (1951), M.B.E. (Member, Order of the
British Empire), William Foyle Poetry Prize (1956), W.H. Smith and
Son Award (1960). Lee died on May 14, 1997.
