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Norman Lewis

Author profile

born

June 28, 1908 in Forty Hill (Enfield, Middlesex, London), The United Kingdom

died

July 22, 2003

gender

male

genre

Nonfiction, Biographies & Memoirs

About this author

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Norman Lewis was a prolific British writer best known for his travel writing. Though not widely known, "Norman Lewis is one of the best writers, not of any particular decade, but of our century", according to Graham Greene.

Lewis served in World War II and wrote an account of his experiences during the Allied occupation of Italy, titled Naples '44. Shortly after the war he produced volumes about Burma, titled Golden Earth, and French Indochina, titled A Dragon Apparent. His intrepid boots-on-the-ground view of Vietnam under French colonial domination, without being itself a political rant, gives context to any discussion of the American experience in that battered and subjugated part of the world.

Lewis was fascinated by cultures which were l...more Norman Lewis was a prolific British writer best known for his travel writing. Though not widely known, "Norman Lewis is one of the best writers, not of any particular decade, but of our century", according to Graham Greene.

Lewis served in World War II and wrote an account of his experiences during the Allied occupation of Italy, titled Naples '44. Shortly after the war he produced volumes about Burma, titled Golden Earth, and French Indochina, titled A Dragon Apparent. His intrepid boots-on-the-ground view of Vietnam under French colonial domination, without being itself a political rant, gives context to any discussion of the American experience in that battered and subjugated part of the world.

Lewis was fascinated by cultures which were little touched by the modern world. This was reflected in his books on travels in Indonesia, An Empire of the East, and among the tribal peoples of India, A Goddess in the Stones.

Lewis's first wife, Ernestina, was a Swiss-Sicilian aristocrat, and Sicilian life, including the Mafia, was another of his major themes, reflected in The Honoured Society and In Sicily. His treatment of the Mafia was not sensationalist but based on an acute understanding of Sicilian society and a deep sympathy with the sufferings of the Sicilian people, without losing sight of the horrors inflicted by the organization.

Another major concern of Lewis's was the impact of missionary activity on tribal societies in Latin America and elsewhere. He was hostile to the activities of missionaries, especially American evangelicals. This is covered in the volume, Among the Missionaries and several shorter pieces. He frequently said that he regarded his life's major achievement as the worldwide reaction to writing on tribal societies in South America. In 1968, his article "Genocide in Brazil", published in the Sunday Times, created such an outcry that it led to the creation of the organisation Survival International, dedicated to the protection of first peoples around the world.

Lewis wrote several volumes of autobiography, again concerned primarily with his observations of the many places in which he lived at various times, which included St Catherine's Island in South Wales near Tenby, the Bloomsbury district of London during World War II, Nicaragua, a Spanish fishing village, and a village near Rome.

Lewis also wrote twelve novels. Some of these enjoyed significant success at the time of publication, but his reputation rests mainly on his travel writing.

He died in Saffron Walden, Essex, survived by his third wife, Lesley, and their son, Gawaine, and two daughters, Kiki and Samara, and by a son, Gareth, and daughter, Karen, from his second marriage with Hester, and by a son, Ito, from his first marriage. His second son Gareth has recently had a novel published called 'Deceit(less)

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Books by Norman Lewis

Average rating: 3.85 · 511 ratings · 94 reviews · 56 distinct works

	Naples '44: A World War II Diary of Occupied Italy 4.15 avg rating — 101 ratings — published 1977 — 14 editions	My rating:
	A Dragon Apparent: Travels in Cambodia, Laos & Vietnam 3.95 avg rating — 57 ratings — published 1982 — 3 editions	My rating:
	Voices of the Old Sea 4.26 avg rating — 43 ratings — published 1986 — 8 editions	My rating:
	The Tomb in Seville: Crossing Spain on the Brink of Civil War 3.80 avg rating — 41 ratings — published 2003 — 5 editions	My rating:
	Golden Earth: Travels in Burma 4.27 avg rating — 26 ratings — published 1952 — 2 editions	My rating:
	The Honoured Society: The Sicilian Mafia Observed 3.62 avg rating — 24 ratings — published 1964 — 5 editions	My rating:
	In Sicily 3.34 avg rating — 29 ratings — published 2001 — 6 editions	My rating:
	The New Roget's Thesaurus in Dictionary Form by Norman Lewis (Editor), American Heritage Editors 4.00 avg rating — 43 ratings — published 1931 — 16 editions	My rating:
	Word Power Made Easy 4.22 avg rating — 294 ratings — published 2 — 19 editions	My rating:
	Missionaries God Against The Indians 3.65 avg rating — 17 ratings — published 1989 — 5 editions	My rating:

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Quotes by Norman Lewis

“I am looking for the people who have always been there, and belong to the places they live. The others I do not wish to see.”
― Norman Lewis

tags: travel

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