Queer Places:
University of Oxford, Oxford, Oxfordshire OX1 3PA
Malvern College, College Rd, Malvern WR14 3DF, Regno Unito
Long Critchel House, Long Crichel, Wimborne BH21 5LF, Regno Unito
Charles Raymond Bell Mortimer
CBE (25 April 1895 – 9 January 1980), who wrote under the name Raymond
Mortimer, was a British writer on art and literature, known mostly as a
critic and
literary editor. He was among the male lovers of
Harold Nicolson.
He was born in Knightsbridge, London, and brought up in Redhill, Surrey. He was educated at Malvern College, and Balliol College, Oxford, which he entered in 1913 to read history. His studies were interrupted by service in a hospital in France from 1915; and then work in the Foreign Office. He did not complete his degree.
In the 1920s he was in Paris, writing fiction. A Francophile, Mortimer broke down in tears when he heard on 21 June 1940 that France had signed an armistice with Germany, saying it was as if half of England had just fallen into the sea.[1] He later became literary editor of the New Statesman, worked at the BBC and in liaison with the Free French in World War II, and subsequently as a book reviewer for The Sunday Times. He was awarded the CBE in the 1955 Queens Birthday Honours.
He was a friend of the poet and novelist Vita Sackville-West, and was involved in a long-term relationship with her husband, author and British diplomat Harold Nicolson. Raymond Mortimer joined the three original owners of Long Crichel House, Wimborne, friends Edward Sackville West, Desmond Shawe-Taylor and Eardley Knollys, as one of the residents, after WW2.[2]
Raymond Mortimer
Edward Le Bas (1904–1966)
National Portrait Gallery, London
Eugene McCown had a soft spot for English aristocrats. During his many stays in London, organized by the journalist Raymond Mortimer, he mingled with Bright Young Things and was particularly close to Patrick Balfour, 3rd Baron Kinross, who owned an apartment in South Kensington
My published books:
