Richardson, Maurice
Entry updated 12 September 2022. Tagged: Author.
(1907-1978) UK journalist and author whose principal genre contribution is a collection of Club Stories, The Exploits of Engelbrecht: Abstracted from the Chronicles of the Surrealist Sportsman's Club (stories June 1946-April 1950 Lilliput; coll of linked stories 1950; exp 2000). This, with enjoyable absurdist Humour, involves Engelbrecht – a dwarf "Surrealist Boxer" – in such unlikely Games and Sports as witch-shooting, boxing literally against Time in the form of a pugilistic grandfather clock, football on the Moon, fishing for water Monsters (in which little Engelbrecht's role is as the bait) and a surrealist Chess game leading to nuclear Holocaust. Fits & Starts (coll 1979) assembles articles, criticism and fiction, including the Parody sf Dystopia "Way Out in the Continuum" (March 1946 Horizon) and the amusing prose poem "Fiendish Nuptials: A Horroratorio", featuring among others Dracula, the Frankenstein Monster, Edgar Allan Poe and Sherlock Holmes; a short-story version was "Unquiet Wedding" (October 1948 Lilliput). Authors influenced by Richardson include Rhys Hughes, whose Engelbrecht Again! (2008) is a Sequel by Other Hands, Spike Milligan and Michael Moorcock. [DRL]
see also: End of Time.
Maurice Lane Richardson
born Springfield, Essex: 24 August 1907
died Uckfield, Sussex: 25 September 1978
works
- A Strong Man Needed (London: W Collins & Sons, 1931) [hb/]
- The Exploits of Engelbrecht: Abstracted from the Chronicles of the Surrealist Sportsman's Club (London: Phoenix House, 1950) [coll of linked stories: illus/hb/James Boswell]
- The Exploits of Engelbrecht: Abstracted from the Chronicles of the Surrealist Sportsman's Club (Manchester, England: Savoy Books, 2000) [coll of linked stories: exp of above with cuts restored and one added story: illus/James Boswell, James Cawthorn, Gerard Hoffnung, Ronald Searle, others: hb/James Boswell]
- Fits & Starts (London: Michael Joseph, 1979) [coll: hb/nonpictorial]
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