Ernest Bramah

Ernest Bramah published 21 books and numerous short stories and features. His humorous works were ranked with Jerome K. Jerome and W. W. Jacobs, his detective stories with Conan Doyle, his politico-science fiction with H. G. Wells, and his supernatural stories with Algernon Blackwood. George Orwell acknowledged that Bramah's book What Might Have Been influenced his Nineteen Eighty-Four. Bramah created the characters Kai Lung and Max Carrados. Ernest Bramah Smith was the son of Charles Clement and Susannah (Brammah) Smith. Aged 16, he dropped out of Manchester Grammar School, having been close to the bottom in each subject. He went into farming, first as a farm pupil and then in his own right. He was supported by his father, who had risen in a short time from a factory hand to a wealthy man. The farming enterprise cost his father £100,000 in today's money, but it was while farming that Bramah began to contribute local vignettes to the Birmingham News. Later he wrote a tongue-in-cheek book about his adventures in farming. It found few buyers, and was remaindered and pulped, though his father agreed to support him while he made his way in Grub Street as a writer. He eventually obtained a position as secretary to Jerome K. Jerome and rose to become editor of one of Jerome's magazines. After leaving Jerome he edited other journals for a publishing firm that later went bankrupt.