Talk:Wyndham Lewis

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Untitled[edit]

The link to the Lewis clip at the NPG is wrong. The correct one is: http://www.npg.org.uk:8080/wyndhamlewis/menof1914/furore.html —Preceding unsigned comment added by 82.108.42.66 (talk) 22:18, 30 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

An anon removed the setence (which followed mention of Lewis's book Hitler) "His associating with the British Fascist Party did not help." Why was this removed? Did Lewis not, in fact, associate himself with the BFP? I was under the impression that he did, but I'm loath to dig out sources unless somebody wants me to. Unless it's untrue, it probably ought to go back in, but I'll wait a bit for responses, since I may be simply misinformed. --Camembert

Don't know the answer, but maybe they felt it was NPOV - maybe they felt it could be argued that his association with the BFP did help! Deb 17:35, 11 Aug 2004 (UTC)


Depends what you mean by 'associated'. Lewis knew Mosely (and painted his portrait) but, to the best of my knowledge, never joined the party. User:BScotland
Lewis was never a member of the British Union of Fascists (as the 'British Fascist Party' was actually called), but contributed an article to the British Union Quarterly in January 1937. He produced two portrait drawings of Mosley. 194.81.81.50 10:23, 23 February 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Birth date?[edit]

What year was Lweis born extactly? I've read various site and they varies from 1882, 1884, to 1886.

NPOV re: first Hitler book[edit]

What does the phrase "insufficiently critical" mean in the context of Lewis' first book about Adolf Hitler? It doesn't strike me as a NPOV statement, as it reflects merely the position of Hitler's post-war critics. Therefore, it should be removed, or more neutrally reworded. According to whom was its criticism "insufficient"? I'm sure there were many pundits and other critics who lambasted it at the time. These sources would help bring this section more in line with NPOV guidelines. I shall begin my search presently. Curtsurly 16:34, 15 May 2005 (UTC)[reply]


Paul O'Keeffe's biography quotes critical reactions from 1931, including one that says 'Here is a mere "write-up" of the Nazi case, entirely uncritical, vague and unsubstantial' (Some Sort of Genius, p. 302). I have altered the sentence in the article to satisfy Curtsurly's objections. 194.81.81.50 10:23, 23 February 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Wyndham Lewises[edit]

There seem to be several: Percy Wyndham Lewis here, D. B. Wyndham-Lewis, and the first husband of Mary Anne Disraeli. Time for disambiguation?--Henrygb 14:52, 21 July 2005 (UTC)[reply]

D.B. Wyndham-Lewis was no relation. (Note the hyphen.) Valetude (talk) 13:47, 21 June 2013 (UTC)[reply]
FWIW, there was also a Geoffrey Wyndham Lewis, author of The Silent Inn (1935). {The poster formerly known as 87.81.230.195} 90.208.88.97 (talk) 22:03, 10 May 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Spanish Civil War[edit]

From the article "The Surrender of Barcelona (1936-38) makes a significant statement about the Spanish Civil War." Further explanation of the picture is necessary. What is this "significant statement" exactly? It's important because you can tell a great deal about a person's political beliefs from their views on the Spanish Civil War. --Tothebarricades 07:43, August 3, 2005 (UTC)


The Surrender of Barcelona (Tate Gallery) was painted in 1936 and was originally called The Siege of Barcelona. Its source is Prescott's History of the Reign of Ferdinand and Isabella the Catholic (1902), and it depicts an event of 1472. Lewis wrote that he had "set out to paint a Fourteenth Century scene [sic] as I should do it could I be transported there." Lewis was clearly aware of the historical parallel, and retitled the painting after the fall of Barcelona in the Spanish Civil War. Lewis was sympathetic to the Francoist side during the Spanish Civil War. His retitling of the picture, when he reproduced it in his 1939 collection of writings, Wyndham Lewis the Artist: From Blast to Burlington House, may nevertheless be related to a passage in the book where he laments the fall of the city and the extinction (as he sees it) of the vibrant culture associated with it. Lewis's attitude to history (as shown in Time and Western Man, was that its cyclical repetitions were not necessary and could be avoided. This painting was probably intended to draw attention to one such repetition rather than to show a political commitment by Lewis to one side or the other in the Civil War. 194.81.81.51 18:38, 31 October 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Poet?[edit]

His entry at List of people by name: Lew called him simply a poet, but i saw no support at all for that role, and made him "British painter, novelist & critic" (with that much detail to help those confused about the name of *D. B. Wyndham-Lewis, 7 years his junior and "British journalist, biographer, humorist, & screenwriter"). Someone who knows what they're doing may have a correction.
--Jerzyt 07:10, 30 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]

He also wrote poetry and plays; his collect poems and plays atr published by Carcanet. Filiocht | The kettle's on 07:22, 30 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Sinclair Lewis image[edit]

Someone has replaced the photo of Wyndham Lewis by Alvin Langdon Coburn with one of Sinclair Lewis. I do not have the technical knowledge to reverse the process.195.137.62.56 17:26, 9 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Done. -Wikeawade

Removed identification with "Bloomsbury"[edit]

I removed this because it appears from this essay that Lewis was independent of Bloomsbury painters.

Wyndham Lewis Paintings and Drawings, by Walter Michel, Introductory Essay by Hugh Kenner; p. 64,65: The Vorticist Movement; "The first important grouping of 'Post-Impressionists' in London was Roger Fry's Omega Workshops. But soon after its opening in 1913, some of the members found reasons to be dissatisfied with the way in which the enterprise was conducted, and in October four of them, Cuthbert Hamilton, Edward Wadsworth, Frederick Etchells, and Lewis, jointly resigned, with the publication of a 'round robin' attacking Fry's direction...But until the Post-Impressionist Exhibition in October 1913 Lewis avoided associating himself with 'Bloomsbury', showing neither with the Grafton Group nor the 'Friday Club' (dominated by Fry, Duncan Grant and Vanessa Bell) in whose annual exhibitions several of the other Vorticists-to-be took part."

p. 74: "Contemporary English artists, institutions or associations of painters -- the Slade School, the New English Art Club, the British 'Fauves' through their journal Rhythm, and the 'Bloomsbury' painters -- provide the background for London's modern art movement, but they had little to offer Lewis."

p. 148: "He was not represented in the Penguin Modern Painters series, published in the fourties and fifties, an omission which he attributed to 'Bloomsbury' influence."

Pistolpierre 18:40, 1 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Camden Town Group[edit]

'He was an unlikely founder-member of the Camden Town Group in 1911.' This disembodied statement needs explaining. Valetude (talk) 13:51, 21 June 2013 (UTC)[reply]

External links modified[edit]

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A Commons file used on this page has been nominated for deletion[edit]

The following Wikimedia Commons file used on this page has been nominated for deletion:

Participate in the deletion discussion at the nomination page. —Community Tech bot (talk) 20:53, 12 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]

I am not a literary scholar. I came across this term as part of the thesis title ("Consciousness versus authority : a study of the critical debate between the Bloomsbury Group and the Men of 1914, 1910-1930 ") of Mary Totah, a woman nominated at AfD,, and I was puzzled as I hadn't heard of the term and can't find it in Wikipedia.

Various sources lead me to Lewis, such as "The modernism of the “Men of 1914”—that group of writers so named by Wyndham Lewis that includes himself, T. S. Eliot, Ezra Pound, and James Joyce and "..what Wyndham Lewis called the 'men of 1914' ", but it's not mentioned here on his page.

Could someone perhaps add a mention if it seems appropriate, and redirect the term to this article? PamD 10:43, 22 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Published but incorrect year of death[edit]

I have no doubt that the currently given date of Lewis's death, 7 March 1957, is correct.

However, I have found that on the back cover of an edition of his 1955 novel Monstre Gai, Jupiter Book J-12 published by John Calder (Publishers) Ltd in 1965, the back-cover blurb includes the statement "The author, who died in 1951, was a central figure . . . [etc.]."

I mention this here in case it becomes a source of confusion in the future. {The poster formerly known as 87.81.230.195} 90.208.88.97 (talk) 22:12, 10 May 2022 (UTC)[reply]