Not to be confused with the American author William Goldman.

Sir William Gerald Golding (19 September 1911 – 19 June 1993) was a British novelist, poet, and winner of the Nobel Prize for Literature (1983), best known for his novel Lord of the Flies. He was also awarded the Booker Prize for literature in 1980, for his novel Rites of Passage, the first book of the trilogy To the Ends of the Earth.

Golding was born on 19 September, 1911 at 47 Mount Wise, Newquay, Cornwall, England. As a published author he referred to his place of birth as being the (medieval) parish of St. Columb Minor, allowing readers to think that he had been born in the village of that name, although he had no connection with it.^[1] The property in the newer, adjacent town of Newquay was a guest house belonging to his mother's family, and he spent many childhood holidays there. He grew up at his family home in Marlborough, Wiltshire, where his father was a science master at Marlborough Grammar School (1905 to retirement). Alec Golding was a socialist with a strong commitment to scientific rationalism, and the young Golding and his elder brother Joseph (known as Jose) attended the school where his father taught (not to be confused with Marlborough College, the "public" boarding school). His mother, Mildred (née Curnoe), kept house at 29, The Green, Marlborough, and supported the moderate campaigners for female suffrage. In 1930 Golding went up to Oxford University as an undergraduate at Brasenose College, where he read Natural Sciences for two years before transferring to English Literature. He took his B.A. (Hons) Second Class in the summer of 1934, and later that year his first book, Poems, was published in London by Macmillan & Co, through the help of his Oxford friend, the anthroposophist Adam Bittleston.

Golding married Ann Brookfield, an analytical chemist, on 30 September 1939. A son was born in 1940 and a daughter in 1944

During World War II, Golding fought in the Royal Navy and was briefly involved in the pursuit (but not the sinking) of Germany's mightiest battleship, the Bismarck. He also participated in the invasion of Normandy on D-Day, commanding a rocket ship, and at war's end returned to teaching and writing.

In September 1953 Golding sent the typescript of a book (previously rejected by approximately 10 publishers),^[2] to Faber & Faber of London. Initially rejected by a reader there, the book was championed by Charles Monteith, then a new editor at the firm, and was published in September 1954 as Lord of the Flies. It was shortly followed by other novels, including The Inheritors, Pincher Martin, and Free Fall.

Publishing success made it possible for Golding to resign his teaching post in 1961, and he spent that academic year as writer-in-residence at Hollins College near Roanoke, Virginia. Having moved in 1958 from Salisbury to nearby Bowerchalke, he met his fellow villager and walking companion James Lovelock. The two discussed Lovelock's hypothesis that the living matter of planet Earth functions like a single organism, and Golding suggested naming this hypothesis after Gaia, the goddess of the earth in Greek mythology.

Golding won the Booker Prize in 1980, and in 1983 he was awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature. He was knighted by the Queen in 1988.

In 1985 Sir William and Lady Golding moved to Perranarworthal, near Truro, Cornwall, where he died of heart failure on June 19, 1993. He was buried in the village churchyard at Bowerchalke, Wiltshire, England. He left the draft of a novel, The Double Tongue, set in Delphi in Roman times, which was published posthumously (Faber, 1995).

Golding's often allegorical fiction makes broad use of allusions to classical literature, mythology, and Christian symbolism. No distinct thread unites his novels, and the subject matter and technique vary. His first novel, Lord of the Flies (1954; film, 1963 and 1990, play, adapted by Nigel Williams, 1995), dealt with an unsuccessful struggle against barbarism and war, thus showing the ambiguity and fragility of civilization. William Golding is also an acclaimed Loch Ness Monster theorist and has written articles for Popular Science about it. The Inheritors (1955) looked back into prehistory, advancing the thesis that humankind's evolutionary ancestors, "the new people," (generally identified with homo sapiens sapiens) triumphed over a gentler race (generally identified with Neanderthals) as much by violence and deceit as by natural superiority. In Pincher Martin (1956) and Free Fall (1959), Golding explored problems of existence, such as survival and freedom, using dreamlike narratives and flashbacks. The Spire (1964) tells the story of a medieval cleric's obsessive determination to build a great cathedral spire, regardless of the consequences.

Golding's later novels include Darkness Visible (1979), The Paper Men (1984), and the comic-historical sea trilogy To the Ends of the Earth (BBC TV & DVD, 2005), comprising the Booker Prize-winning Rites of Passage (1981), Close Quarters (1987), and Fire Down Below (1989).

• Poems (1934)
• Lord of the Flies (1954)
• The Inheritors (1955)
• Pincher Martin (1956)
• The Brass Butterfly (play) (1958)
• Free Fall (1959)
• The Spire (1964)
• The Hot Gates (essays) (1965)
• The Pyramid (1967)
• The Scorpion God (1971)
• Darkness Visible (1979)
• A Moving Target (essays) (1982)
• The Paper Men (1984)
• An Egyptian Journal (1985)
• To the Ends of the Earth (trilogy)
  • Rites of Passage (1980)
  • Close Quarters (1987)
  • Fire Down Below (1989)
• The Double Tongue (posthumous) (1995)

• The Spire a sixth form perspective at William Howard School
• Golding's Life and work reviewed at the Educational Paperback Association
• Biography of William Golding at the Nobel Prize website
• Interview by Mary Lynn Scott- Universal Pessimist, Cosmic Optimist
• Faber and Faber - UK publisher of William Golding
• William Golding Ltd Website of Golding family.
• Last Words An account of Golding's last evening by D.M. Thomas - Guardian - Saturday 10 June 2006 (Review Section)
• Oxford Dictionary of National Biography article by Kevin McCarron (online edn, May 2006), Golding, Sir William Gerald (1911–1993) [1]] accessed 3 Dec 2006.

By: Callie Maarson