INTRODUCTION
Anthony Burgess was born in Manchester in 1917 and is a graduate of the
University there. After six years in the Army he worked as an instructor for
the Central Advisory Council for Forces Education, as a lecturer in
Phonetics and as a grammar school master. From 1954 till 1960 he was an
education officer in the Colonial Service, stationed in Malaya and Brunei.
He became a full-time writer in 1960, though his first novel had been
published four years earlier. A late starter in the art of fiction, he had
spent his creative energy previously on music, and he has composed many
full-scale works for orchestra and other media.
Anthony Burgess maintains his old interest in music and in linguistics,
and these have conditioned the style and content of the novels he writes.
Though he and his wife no longer live abroad, foreign travel remains a great
source of inspiration. He has, to date, published many novels, a book on
linguistics, and various critical works.