J. D. Beresford


John Davys Beresford was an English writer, now remembered for his early science fiction and some short stories in the horror story and ghost story genres. Beresford was a great admirer of H.G. Wells,
and wrote the first critical study of Wells in 1915. His Wellsian novel The Hampdenshire Wonder was a major influence on Olaf Stapledon. His other science-fiction novels include The Riddle of the Tower, about a dystopian, hive-like society.

Life

His father was a clergyman in Castor, now in Cambridgeshire near Peterborough. J. D. Beresford was affected by infantile paralysis, which left him partially disabled. He was educated at Oundle.
After training to become an architect, he became a professional writer, first as a dramatist, and journalist. In early adulthood he broke away from his father's views and became a "determined but defensive" agnostic. He combined a prominent place in Edwardian literary London with time spent in the provinces, in particular Cornwall, where D. H. Lawrence had an extended stay in his Porthcothan cottage. Later in life Beresford abandoned his earlier agnosticism and described himself as a Theosophist and a pacifist.
Beresford was also interested in psychology, and attended several meetings organised by A.R. Orage to discuss psychological issues. Other attendees at these meetings included Havelock Ellis, Clifford Sharp, David Eder and Maurice Nicoll.
Beresford also contributed to numerous publications; in addition to being a book reviewer for The Manchester Guardian, he also wrote for the New Statesman, The Spectator, Westminster Gazette,and the Theosophist magazine The Aryan Path. At one point, Beresford was offered the editorship of the pacifist magazine Peace News but declined because he felt he "would be a bad editor".
Beresford's interest in the spiritual and philosophical may be best illustrated by the publisher notes to his novel, On A Huge Hill:
"Mr Beresford's readers have long known that that for him there are more things in heaven or earth than are dreamt of in official medical philosophy. He has used his novelist's skill to convince the sensitive reader that the age of miracles is not over, and that, in certain circumstances, the spirit may exercise what seem to us miraculous powers over the substance of the body. This he did in 'The Camberwell Miracle' and 'Peckover'; and in this absorbing novel, he returns to the theme, with the study of a man fitting himself to become a great healer."
Dorothy L. Sayers quotes from Beresford's essay "Writing Aloud" in her book on theology, Mind of the Maker. She also mentions him in passing in Whose Body?.
George Orwell in 1945 described him as a "natural novelist", whose strength, particularly in A Candidate for Truth, was his ability to take seriously the problems of ordinary people.
Elisabeth Beresford, children's writer and creator of The Wombles, was his daughter. Through his son, writer Marc Brandel, he is the great-grandfather of American actor James Newman.

Works