Arnold Bennett,
the son of a solicitor, was born in Hanley, Staffordshire, in 1867. Educated
locally and at London University, he became
a solicitor's clerk, but later transferred to journalism, and in 1893 became
assistant editor of the journal Woman.
Bennett published his first novel The Man from the North in
1898. This was followed by Anna of the Five Towns
(1902), The Old Wives' Tale (1908), Clayhanger (1910), The
Card (1911) and Hilda Lessways (1911).
Soon after the outbreak of the First World War, Charles Masterman the
head of the War Propaganda Bureau (WPB) invited
twenty-five leading British authors to Wellington House, to discuss ways of
best promoting
Bennett soon became one of the most important figures in this secret
organisation. His first contribution to the propaganda effort was Liberty:
A Statement of the British Case. It
first appeared as an article in the Saturday Evening Post. In
December it was expanded and published as a pamphlet by the War Propaganda Bureau. To disguise the
fact it was a government publication, the WPB used the Hodder
and
When George Bernard Shaw, who was unaware of the existence
of the War Propaganda Bureau, attacked what
he believed to be jingoistic articles and poems being produced by British
writers during the war, Bennett was the one chosen to defend their actions in
the press.
In June, 1915, the WPB arranged for Bennett to tour the Western Front.
Bennett was deeply shocked by the conditions in the trenches and was physically
ill for several weeks afterwards. His friend, Frank Swinnerton,
later recalled, "he visited the front as a duty,
and was horrified at what he saw and felt that he must not express that
horror." Bennett agreed to provide an account of the war that would
encourage men to join the British Army. The result was
the pamphlet, Over There: War Scenes on the Western Front (1915).
In March, 1918, Lord Beaverbrook, the
new Minister of Information, recruited Bennett and Charles Masterman to
join his new three-man British War Memorial Committee (BWMC). Their
job was to select artists to produce paintings that would help the war effort.
Bennett was also appointed director of British propaganda in
After the war Bennett returned to writing novels such as Riceyman Steps
(1923) and
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