Clive Sinclair (author)

Sinclair, who was born into a Jewish family originally named Smolensky,William D. Rubinstein, Michael Jolles, Hilary L. Rubinstein, The Palgrave Dictionary of Anglo-Jewish History, Palgrave Macmillan (2011), p. 922 grew up in Hendon, North London, and was educated at the University of East Anglia (BA, PhD), the University of California, Santa Cruz, and at the University of Exeter.{{cite book | title = Debrett's People of Today | year = 2009 | publisher = Debrett's Ltd | isbn = 978-1-870520-51-5 }}

Although his writing career began with short stories that appeared in magazines and journals, his first book was a novel – Bibliosexuality – which was published in 1973 by Allison and Busby.Matthew Asprey, [http://lareviewofbooks.org/interview/el-hombre-valeroso-an-interview-with-clive-sinclair "El Hombre Valeroso: An Interview with Clive Sinclair"], Los Angeles Review of Books, 18 December 2012. As he said in a 2012 interview: "The truth is I've always been a short story writer rather than a novelist. Bibliosexuality was originally a collection of short stories about a certain David Drollkind. Margaret Busby said she would publish it, if I could find a way of linking them. That's how it became a novel."

Sinclair went on to become better known as a writer of short stories, with his next book, the 1981 collection Hearts of Gold, winning him the Somerset Maugham Award. In 1983, he was recognised in Granta′s list of Best Young British Novelists.[http://www.granta.com/Archive/7 Granta 7: Best of Young British Novelists.] He subsequently published several novels and collections of shorter fiction, in addition to non-fiction, such as biography and travel writing. His stories, interviews, travel pieces and reviews appeared in a wide range of publications, including Encounter, The Year’s Best Horror Stories, New Review, London Magazine, Penthouse, Club International, Transatlantic Review, Lilith, Monat, The Guardian, The Independent, Contrappasso Magazine.[http://contrappassomag.wordpress.com/2013/01/01/from-issue-2-str82anl-by-clive-sinclair-excerpt/ "from issue #2: ‘STR82ANL’ by Clive Sinclair (excerpt I)"], Contrappasso Magazine: International Writing, 1 January 2013. and The Times Literary Supplement (TLS).

Between 1983 and 1987, Sinclair was literary editor of The Jewish Chronicle, and in 1988 he was the British Council Guest Writer-in-residence at the University of Uppsala, Sweden.[http://literature.britishcouncil.org/clive-sinclair Clive Sinclair biography] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140301171657/http://literature.britishcouncil.org/clive-sinclair |date=1 March 2014 }}, British Council. He had been the British Library Penguin Writer's Fellow, as well as a visiting lecturer, most frequently at the University of East Anglia (UEA), but also at the University of California, Santa Cruz, his special subjects being gothic fiction, creative writing, detective fiction, and Holocaust literature.

His other books include A Soap Opera From Hell: Essays on the Facts of Life and the Facts of Death (1998), Clive Sinclair's True Tales of the Wild West (2008), and Death & Texas (2014).[http://vimeo.com/86207911 Death & Texas] on Vimeo.

Sinclair was elected a fellow of the Royal Society of Literature in 1983.{{cite web |url=http://www.rslit.org/content/fellows |title=Royal Society of Literature All Fellows |publisher=Royal Society of Literature |access-date=10 August 2010 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20100305070326/http://www.rslit.org/content/fellows |archive-date=5 March 2010 }}

Sinclair died in March 2018, aged 70. A posthumous collection of his work, entitled Shylock Must Die – based on the character Shylock in Shakespeare's The Merchant of Venice – was published in July 2018.Ben Welch, [https://www.thejc.com/news/uk-news/clive-sinclair-author-the-lady-with-the-laptop-and-other-stories-dies-aged-70-1.459962 "Author Clive Sinclair dies aged 70"], Jewish Chronicle, 5 March 2018David Herman, [https://www.thejc.com/culture/books/book-review-shylock-must-die-1.467437 "Book review: Shylock Must Die"], Jewish Chronicle, 19 July 2018.Elizabeth Lowry, [https://www.the-tls.co.uk/articles/private/it-was-his-humour/ "It was his humour – Final stories of a comic master"], TLS, 22 August 2018.

In 1979 Sinclair married Fran (née Redhouse), a special needs teacher, with whom he had a son, Seth; she died at the age of 46. For the last 20 years of Sinclair's life his partner was artist Haidee Becker.{{cite news|url=https://www.theguardian.com/books/2018/may/10/clive-sinclair-obituary|title=Clive Sinclair obituary|first=Seth|last=Sinclair|newspaper=The Guardian|date=10 May 2018}}

• Bibliosexuality: A novel. London: Allison and Busby, 1973.
• Hearts of Gold (short stories). London: Allison and Busby, 1979.
• Bedbugs (short stories). London: Allison and Busby, 1982.
• The Brothers Singer (a biography of Isaac Bashevis Singer, I. J. Singer, and Esther Kreitman). London; Allison & Busby (distributed in the US by Schocken Books), 1983.
• Blood Libels (novel). London: Allison and Busby, 1985. New York: Farrar, Straus, Giroux, 1986.
• Cosmetic Effects (novel). London, 1991.
• Augustus Rex: A Novel. London: Andre Deutsch, 1992.
• The Lady with the Laptop and Other Stories. London: Picador, 1996.
• For Good or Evil: Collected Stories. London: Picador, 1998.
• A Soap Opera From Hell: Essays on the Facts of Life and the Facts of Death. London: Picador, 1998.
• Meet the Wife (novel). London: Picador, 2002.
• Clive Sinclair's True Tales of the Wild West (travel). London: Picador, 2008.
• Death & Texas (short stories). London: Halban Publishers, 2014.
• Shylock Must Die (short stories). London: Halban Publishers, 2018. {{ISBN|978-1905559947}}

• 1981: Somerset Maugham Award (Hearts of Gold)
• 1997: Jewish Quarterly-Wingate Prize (The Lady with the Laptop and Other Stories)
• 1997: Macmillan Silver Pen Award (The Lady with the Laptop and Other Stories)

{{Reflist}}

• [https://web.archive.org/web/20140301171657/http://literature.britishcouncil.org/clive-sinclair Guy Woodward, "Clive Sinclair"], Literature – British Council.
• Matthew Asprey Gear, [https://contrappassomag.wordpress.com/2017/07/25/el-hombre-valeroso-an-interview-with-clive-sinclair/ "El Hombre Valeroso: An Interview with Clive Sinclair"], Contrappasso Magazine, 25 July 2017.
• [http://britishlibrary.typepad.co.uk/asian-and-african/2014/01/a-prodigal-balinese-manuscript-leaf-is-reunited-with-its-family.html "A prodigal Balinese manuscript leaf is reunited with its family"], British Library, 20 January 2014.
• [https://lionandthehunter.wordpress.com/2012/05/21/criminally-neglected-authors-clive-sinclair-and-his-bedbugs-1982/ "Criminally Neglected Authors: Clive Sinclair and his ‘Bedbugs’ (1982)"], Lion and the Hunter, 21 May 2012.

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Category:1948 births

Category:2018 deaths

Category:Alumni of the University of East Anglia

Category:University of California, Santa Cruz alumni

Category:Jewish British writers

Category:Fellows of the Royal Society of Literature

Category:20th-century British novelists

Category:British male short story writers

Category:Alumni of the University of Essex

Category:People from Hendon

Category:Writers from the London Borough of Barnet