Life of James Hilton
...s first article, which was accepted by the Manchester Guardian at the age of seventeen. James Hilton was a lucky man, because he got an early start in his literature career. At the age of seventeen, while he was still in college, he got his first article printed in Manchester Guardian. He started his first novel, Catherine Herself, at the same age, but did not get it finished until nineteen twenty while he was still at the Cambridge College(Current, 372). During the four years Hilton was at the college He had a twice-weekly column in the Irish Independent(Current, 372). Even though Catherine Herself did not get much attention, Hilton continued to write novels. His next novel was published in nineteen twenty-two, and was titled Storm Passage. And two years after he had The Passionate Year published. After those two books were he went back to writing articles for newspapers: Daily News, Star, Manchester Guardian(Current, 372). He told an interviewer that he had never worked so hard "As when slaving in grimy old Fleet Street. I read twenty novels a week, reviewing eight out of the lot, wrote two special articles and put in a few hours at night on a novel I was doing(Current,372)." Some of Hilton's friends told him that if he really wanted to make money, he would have to write a detective story. "This was my only attempt to write a book solely for money-a thing which I think should never be done. But friends said I should write a detective story. I did one, Heaven help me. It was called Was It Murder. Both financially and artistically it was(Current,372)." In nineteen thirty-one Hilton wrote a book, And Now Goodbye, that got a considerable more amount of attention than Was It Murder. And this novel made more profit for him. In nineteen thirty-four things changed when he got a little bit of fame which he describes."My first stroke of good luck came all unknown to me in the latter part of nineteen thirty-three I was approached by the editor of the British Weekly, great non-conformist Protestant publication, who asked me to write a long short story for his special Christmas supplement to be completed within a fortnight… Then one foggy morning I got out on my bicycle and determined to just run away from my hag-ridden self. I was enjoying the keen air and exercise when suddenly an idea bopped up and I saw my whole story in a flash. I rode back home as hard as I could go, and in four days I had banged out the whole thing. That was Good-bye, Mr. Chips….it got a mildly favorable comment, and I considered it a closed chapter(Curr...