Christopher Isherwood

26 August 1904 (High Lane, Cheshire County) - 4 January 1986 (Santa Monica, California). Novelist and playwright.

Biography

Isherwood studied history at Corpus Christi College in Cambridge where he met the poet W.H. Auden. He also studied medicine at King's College in London but he did not finish his studies, instead he went on a trip to Germany to visit Auden there with whom he had an occasional sexual relationship. During his stay in Berlin (1929-1933)Isherwood lived among others in Berlin-Schöneberg where a plaque commemorates his resdidence. In Berlin he also met his first boyfriend Heinz. Isherwood was intrigued by the Weimar Republic and the sexual freedom which existed there. In 1939 Isherwood emigrated to California where he worked as freelance and screenwriter for various Hollywood Studios. From 1959-1962 he worked as a visting professor for Modern English Literature at the Los Angeles State College.

He lived in a relationship with Don Bachardy (who was 30 years younger than Isherwood) as a respectable couple in Hollywood. Although McCarthy's policy was highly homophobic, Isherwood and Bachardy lived their homosexuality openly. The partnership lasted until Isherwood's death in 1986. In 1946 Isherwood obtained the American citizenship.

Isherwood is renowned for his short stories and novels. In his autobiographical work Kathleen and Frank which is about his parents and his relationship towards them Isherwood affirms openly his homosexuality. Goodbye to Berlin (1939) and Mr Norris Changes Trains provide an inside view into the last days of the Weimar Republic. The stories formed the basis for John Van Druten's play I am a Camera (1951) and were later turned into the musical Cabaret (1966) - probably best-known in the film version of 1972 starring Liza Minnelli as Sally Bowles.

Another autobiography is Christopher and His Kind which deals with the young Christopher Isherwood coming to Berlin to visit his close friend and lover W.H Auden exploring the queer German subculture. In 2011 Christopher and his Kind was turned into a movie by Geoffrey Sax starring the latest Doctor Who actor Matt Smith.

The drama movie A Single Man (2009) is also based on the same name novel by Isherwood. It is the directed by the fomer Gucci Designer Tom Ford starring Julian Moore and Collin Firth as the protagonist George Falconer, an homosexual university professor who is not able to organise his life after the sudden death of his lifelong partner. Collin Firth received a BAFTA in 2010 as the best actor.

Sources: Piazza, Paul(1978): Christopher Isherwood: Myth and Anti-Myth. New York: Colombia University Press

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