Hugo Charteris

Hugo Francis Guy Charteris MC (11 December 1922 – 20 December 1970) was a noted British novelist and screenwriter, the author of nine novels, 17 television screenplays and numerous children's books and short stories.

Early life Charteris was born in London, the fourth child of Captain Hon. Guy Lawrence Charteris (1886–1967, the son of Hugo Charteris, 11th Earl of Wemyss, and Mary Constance Wyndham), and his first wife, Frances Lucy Tennant (1887–1925), a granddaughter of Sir Charles Tennant. His sisters were the socialite Ann Fleming and Laura Spencer-Churchill, Duchess of Marlborough. He and his sisters grew up at Stanway House surrounded by the creative influence of close family friends such as James Barrie, who would write plays for them to perform during the summer months. Charteris was educated at Eton and in 1941 he left to join the Scots Guards. He was twice wounded in the war, and received a Military Cross in Italy for defending his position against continuous enemy attack.

Career After the war, he went to Malaya and Java where he served as a public relations officer for south-east Asia command (1945–47). He then went to Oxford where he read English at Trinity College for a few frustrating terms (1947–48). In 1948 he married Virginia Mary (born 1922), daughter of Colin Forbes Adam and granddaughter of Beilby Lawley, 3rd Baron Wenlock. Together they had two sons and three daughters. The eldest son, Richard, drowned at their home in Scotland in 1951.

Through his brother-in-law, newspaper baron Esmond Harmsworth, 2nd Viscount Rothermere,

He still wrote occasional pieces for newspapers and in 1959 interviewed Carl Jung for The Daily Telegraph at Bollingen.

He worked with BBC producer Verity Lambert on scripts to adapt his novel, The Coat (1966), into either a film or television series. Work continued on the screenplays after his death by other writers but the ideas never came to fruition.

Novels A Share of the World (1953); new publication: introduced by Jane Charteris, Gawler South, South Australia : Michael Walmer, 2014, Marching with April (1956); new publication: introduced by Frederic Raphael, with a review by Elizabeth Bowen, Adelaide, South Australia : Michael Walmer, 2017, The Tide is Right (publication abandoned 1957, published 1991); introduction by Nicholas Mosley, Elmwood Park, IL, USA : Dalkey Archive Press, 1992, Picnic at Porokorro (1958); new edition: Adelaide, South Australia : Michael Walmer, 2019, The Lifeline (1961) Clunie (1963, children's novel) Pictures on the Wall (1963) Staying with Aunt Rozzie (1964, children's novel) The River Watcher (1965) The Coat (1966) The Indian Summer of Gabriel Murray (1968)