Editing Michael Arlen

{{Short description|Writer (1895–1956)}}
{{family name hatnote|Sarkis|Kouyoumdjian|lang=Bulgarian}}
{{for|his son, the writer|Michael J. Arlen}}
{{More citations needed|date=December 2020}}
{{Infobox writer
| name          = Michael Arlen
| image         = Image:Time-magazine-cover-michael-arlen.jpg
| alt           =
| caption       = Arlen on the cover of ''[[Time (magazine)|Time]]'' in 1927
| birth_name    = Dikran Sarkis Kouyoumdjian
| birth_date    = {{birth date|df=yes|1895|11|16}}
| birth_place   = [[Ruse, Bulgaria|Ruse]], Bulgaria
| death_date    = {{death date and age|df=yes|1956|6|23|1895|11|16}}
| death_place   = New York City, U.S.
| resting_place =
| occupation    = {{hlist|Essayist|short story writer|novelist|playwright|scriptwriter}}
| language      =
| nationality   =
| citizenship   = {{plainlist|
*Bulgarian (1895–1922)
*British (1922–1956)
}}
| education     = [[Malvern College]]
| alma_mater    = [[University of Edinburgh]]
| genre         =
| subject       =
| movement      =
| spouse        = {{marriage|Atalanta Mercati|1928}}
| partner       =
| children      = 2, including [[Michael J. Arlen|Michael]]
| years_active  =
}}

'''Michael Arlen''' (born '''Dikran Sarkis Kouyoumdjian''';{{efn|{{langx|bg|Дикран Саркис Куюмджян}}}}, '''{{langx|hy|Տիգրան Գույումճյան}}''', 16 November 1895 – 23 June 1956) was an essayist, short story writer, novelist, playwright, and scriptwriter. He had his greatest successes in the 1920s while living and writing in England, publishing the best-selling novel ''[[The Green Hat (novel)|The Green Hat]]'' in 1924. Arlen is most famous for his satirical romances set in English smart society, but he also wrote [[gothic horror]] and psychological thrillers, for instance "The Gentleman from America", which was filmed in 1948 as ''[[The Fatal Night]]'', and again in 1956 as a television episode for [[Alfred Hitchcock]]'s TV series ''[[Alfred Hitchcock Presents]]''. Near the end of his life, Arlen mainly occupied himself with political writing. Arlen's vivid but colloquial style "with unusual inversions and inflections with a heightened exotic pitch"<ref>Alec Waugh, "What Happened to Michael Arlen?", ''Harper's Monthly Magazine'', 210:1257 (1955:Feb.), p. 86</ref> came to be known as 'Arlenesque'.

Very much a 1920s society figure resembling the characters he portrayed in his novels, and a man who might be referred to as a [[dandy]], Arlen invariably impressed everyone with his immaculate manners. He was always impeccably dressed and groomed, and was seen driving around [[London]] in a fashionable yellow [[Rolls-Royce car|Rolls-Royce]] and engaging in various luxurious activities. However, he was well aware of the latent suspicion of foreigners, mixed with the envy with which his success was viewed by some.

His works became an inspiration for famous Hollywood movies such as ''[[A Woman of Affairs]]'' (1928), starring [[Greta Garbo]] and [[John Gilbert (actor)|John Gilbert]]; ''[[The Golden Arrow (1936 film)|The Golden Arrow]]'' (1936), starring [[Bette Davis]]; and he was screenwriter of ''[[The Heavenly Body]]'' (1944), based on a story by Jacques Théry, starring [[William Powell]] and [[Hedy Lamarr]].<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.imdb.com/name/nm0035158/|title=Michael Arlen|website=[[IMDb]] }}</ref>

==Biography==

===Early life===
Michael Arlen was born Dikran Sarkis Kouyoumdjian<ref>{{cite book |title=Motion Picture Production Encyclopedia |date=1951 |publisher=[[The Hollywood Reporter]] |page=265}}</ref> on 16 November 1895, in [[Ruse, Bulgaria|Ruse]], [[Principality of Bulgaria|Bulgaria]], to an [[Armenians|Armenian]] merchant family. In 1892, his family moved to [[Plovdiv]], Bulgaria, after fleeing [[Ottoman Turks|Turkish]] persecutions of Armenians in the [[Ottoman Empire]]. In Plovdiv, Arlen's father, Sarkis Kouyoumdjian, established a successful import business. In 1895, Arlen was born as the youngest child of five, having three brothers, Takvor, Krikor, and Roupen, and one sister, Ahavni. Arlen's family moved once more: this time to the seaside town of [[Southport]] in [[Lancashire]], England.<ref>Harry Keyishian, ''Michael Arlen'', Twayne, Boston: 1975, pp. 11-14</ref>

===Adolescence===
After studying at [[Malvern College]] and spending a brief time in Switzerland, the young Arlen enrolled as a medical student at the [[University of Edinburgh]],<ref>Harry Keyishian, ''Michael Arlen'', Twayne, Boston: 1975, p. 11</ref> despite his and his family's intention that he attend the [[University of Oxford]]. If we are to view Arlen's first published book, ''The London Venture'', as being semi-autobiographical, then we will never know why Arlen made this "silly mistake"<ref>Michael Arlen, ''The London Venture'', George H. Doran, New York: 1920, p. 131</ref> of going to Edinburgh instead of Oxford. We know however what led Arlen to London, where he would make his break into a literary career.

In ''The London Venture'', Arlen wrote: "I, up at Edinburgh, was on the high road to general fecklessness. I only stayed there a few months; jumbled months of elementary medicine, political economy, metaphysics, theosophy – I once handed round programmes at an Annie Besant lecture at the Usher Hall – and beer, lots of beer. And then, one night, I emptied my last mug, and with another side-glance at Oxford, came down to London; 'to take up a literary career' my biographer will no doubt write of me." (p.&nbsp;132)

In 1913, after a few months of university, Arlen moved to London to live by writing. A year later, the [[First World War]] broke out and made Arlen's position in England as a Bulgarian national rather difficult. Arlen's nationality was still Bulgarian, but Bulgaria had disowned him because he would not serve in Bulgaria's army. Bulgaria being allies with Germany made England suspicious of Arlen, who could neither be naturalized as a British citizen, nor change his name. In London, Arlen found company in [[modernist]] literary circles with others who had been looked upon suspiciously or had been denied military service. Among these were [[Aldous Huxley]], [[D. H. Lawrence]], [[Nancy Cunard]], and [[George Moore (novelist)|George Moore]].<ref>Waugh, p. 85</ref>

===Young adulthood===
Arlen began his literary career in 1916, writing under his birth name, Dikran Kouyoumdjian, firstly in a London-based Armenian periodical, ''[[Ararat: A Searchlight on Armenia]]'', and soon afterward for ''[[The New Age]]'', a British weekly review of politics, arts, and literature. For these two magazines, Arlen wrote essays, book reviews, personal essays, short stories, and even one short play.

His last submissions to ''The New Age'', a series of semi-autobiographical personal essays entitled "The London Papers", were assembled in 1920 and published with slight revisions as ''The London Venture''. From this time onward he began to sign his works as 'Michael Arlen'. In January and April 1920, he had already published two short stories in ''[[The English Review]]'' signed thus. He became naturalized as a British citizen in 1922, and legally changed from his birth name to Michael Arlen.

Arlen spent some time in France with Nancy Cunard in 1920, although she was married to someone else at the time; the relationship fuelled Aldous Huxley's jealousy. During the 1920s, Arlen rented rooms opposite 'The Grapes' public house in [[Shepherd Market]], then a bohemian [[Mayfair]] address. He later used Shepherd Market as the setting for ''[[The Green Hat (novel)|The Green Hat]]''.

====Fame and fortune====
After ''The London Venture'', Arlen worked on romances, spicing them with elements of psychological thrills and horror, including ''The Romantic Lady'', ''These Charming People'', and ''"Piracy": A Romantic Chronicle of These Days''. In ''These Charming People,'' for instance, Arlen wrote tales which included elements of [[fantasy]] and [[horror fiction|horror]], in particular "The Ancient Sin" and "The Loquacious Lady of Lansdowne Passage". The volume also introduced a 'gentleman crook' reminiscent of [[Raffles the Thief|Raffles]]. His identity is not entirely clear until the story "Salute the Cavalier". The title of another story, "When a Nightingale Sang in Berkeley Square", was the inspiration for the [[A Nightingale Sang in Berkeley Square (song)|popular song of the same name]].

These works culminated in the book that would launch Arlen's fame and fortune in the 1920s: ''The Green Hat'', published in 1924. ''The Green Hat'' narrates the short life and violent death of Iris Storm, a ''femme fatale'' and dashing widow, the owner of a yellow [[Hispano-Suiza]] as well as the green hat of the title. Arlen adapted the novel for a [[The Green Hat (play)|1925 Broadway play]],<ref>[https://www.ibdb.com/Production/View/9898 The Green Hat]</ref> starring [[Katharine Cornell]] and [[Leslie Howard (actor)|Leslie Howard]] in his most successful Broadway appearance to date. An almost simultaneous but less successful adaptation in London's [[West End theatre|West End]] starred [[Tallulah Bankhead]]. The book figures in ''[[A Question of Upbringing]]'' by [[Anthony Powell]] as representative of life in Shepherd Market.

The novel was adapted for the silent 1928 Hollywood film ''[[A Woman of Affairs]]'' starring [[Greta Garbo]] and [[John Gilbert (actor)|John Gilbert]]. ''The Green Hat'' was considered provocative in the United States; hence, the movie was not allowed to make any references to it. The film obscured or altered plot points in the novel concerning homosexuality and venereal disease. It was adapted a second time in 1934, as ''[[Outcast Lady]]'', with [[Constance Bennett]] and [[Herbert Marshall]] in the main roles.

After the publication of ''The Green Hat'', Arlen became almost instantly famous, rich, and as with celebrities today, incessantly in the spotlight and newspapers. During this period of his fame, the mid-1920s, Arlen frequently travelled to the United States and worked on plays and films, including ''Dear Father'' and ''These Charming People''.

According to [[Noël Coward]]'s biographer [[Sheridan Morley]], in 1924 Arlen rescued the play ''The Vortex'' by writing Coward a cheque for £250 when it seemed that otherwise the production would collapse (according to Coward himself—“Present Indicative,” p.&nbsp;188–it was for £200). ''The Vortex'' made Coward's name.

Naturally, after all this fame and attention, Arlen felt somewhat anxious to write the book that would follow ''The Green Hat''. Notwithstanding, Arlen wrote ''Young Men in Love'' (1927) and received mixed reviews.

After ''Young Men in Love'', Arlen continued with ''Lily Christine'' (1928), ''Babes in the Wood'' (1929), and ''Men Dislike Women'' (1931), none of which received the enthusiastic reviews that ''The Green Hat'' had received. Arlen also wrote a volume of ''Ghost Stories'' (1927), which were influenced by [[Saki]], [[Oscar Wilde]] and [[Arthur Machen]].<ref>Chris Morgan, "Ghost Stories (Arlen)", in Magill, Frank N., ed. ''Survey of Modern Fantasy Literature'', Vol 2. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Salem Press, Inc., 1983. {{ISBN|0893564508}} (pp. 605–606).</ref><ref name="nw">"Among his fictional works, Arlen wrote a number of supernatural pieces which demonstrate a variety of literary influences ranging from Saki and Oscar Wilde to Arthur Machen". Neil Wilson, ''Shadows in the Attic: A Guide to British supernatural fiction, 1820-1950'' British Library, London, 2000. {{ISBN|0712310746}}. (pp. 35–6)</ref>

===Later life===
[[File:Michael Arlen (born Dikran Sarkis Kouyoumdjian) on ship, 1920s - LCCN2014718280 (cropped).jpg|left|thumb|Michael Arlen on ship, 1920s]]
In 1927, Arlen, feeling ill, joined [[D. H. Lawrence]] in [[Florence]], Italy.  Lawrence was working on ''[[Lady Chatterley's Lover]]'' and Arlen served as a model for the character Michaelis.

Arlen then moved to Cannes, France and, in 1928, married Countess Atalanta Mercati. They had two children, a son, [[Michael J. Arlen|Michael John Arlen]] born in 1930, and a daughter, Venetia Arlen, born in 1933.

With his following novel, ''Man's Mortality'' (1933), Arlen turned to political writing and [[science fiction]], brushing aside his earlier, smart society romances. Set fifty years in the future, in 1983, the book can be seen as portraying a [[Dystopia]], whose rulers claim that it is a [[Utopia]]. Most critics compared it unfavourably with Huxley's ''[[Brave New World]]'', which had been published the previous year.

In the following years, Arlen also returned to [[gothic horror]] with ''Hell! Said the Duchess: A Bed-Time Story'' (1934). In his final collection of short stories, ''The Crooked Coronet'' (1939), Arlen briefly returns to his earlier romantic, but also comic, style. Arlen's claim to fame in the world of [[crime fiction]] rests on one [[short story]], "[[Gay Falcon]]" (1940), in which he introduced gentleman sleuth Gay Stanhope Falcon. Renamed Gay Lawrence and nicknamed 'the Falcon', the character was taken up by [[Hollywood, Los Angeles, California|Hollywood]] in 1941, and expanded into a series of mystery films with [[George Sanders]] in the title role. When Sanders left the role, he was succeeded by his brother [[Tom Conway]], who played Gay Lawrence's brother Tom and also used the nickname 'the Falcon'.

In 1939, when the [[World War II|Second World War]] began, Arlen returned to England. While his wife, Atalanta, joined the [[Red Cross]], Arlen wrote columns for ''[[Tatler (1901)|The Tatler]]''. That same year, his final book, ''[[The Flying Dutchman (novel)|The Flying Dutchman]]'' (1939), was published, a political novel, commenting harshly on Germany's position in the war.

In 1940, Arlen was appointed Civil Defence Public Relations Officer for the East Midlands, but when his loyalty to England was questioned in the [[British House of Commons|House of Commons]] in 1941, he resigned and moved to America, where he settled in New York in 1946. For the next ten years of his life, Arlen suffered from [[writer's block]]. 

He died of cancer on June 23, 1956, in New York.

==Critical reception==
Horror writer [[Karl Edward Wagner]] included ''Hell! Said the Duchess'' on his list of "The Thirteen Best Supernatural Horror Novels" in the May 1983 issue of ''[[Twilight Zone literature|The Twilight Zone Magazine]]''.<ref>N. G. Christakos, "Three By Thirteen: The Karl Edward Wagner Lists" in ''Black Prometheus: A Critical Study of Karl Edward Wagner'', ed. [[Benjamin Szumskyj]], Gothic Press 2007. {{ISBN|978-0913045145}}</ref> [[F. Scott Fitzgerald]] was an admirer of Arlen's work. In ''A Moveable Feast'', [[Ernest Hemingway]] recounts how, as he and Fitzgerald were sharing a long car journey to Paris, Fitzgerald told him the plots of all Arlen's books, concluding that the author was "the man you had to watch".<ref>''A Moveable Feast'', Ernest Hemingway, 1964.</ref>

==Selected bibliography==

===Novels===
*''[https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/40375 The London Venture]'' (Heinemann, 1920)
*''[https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/46217 The Romantic Lady]'' (George H. Doran Company, 1921)
*''[https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/73774 Piracy]'' (Collins, 1922)
*''[[The Green Hat (novel)|The Green Hat]]'' (Collins, 1924)
*''[https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/72477 These Charming People]'' (George H. Doran Company, 1924)
*''[https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/72651 May Fair]'' (George H. Doran Company, 1925)
*[https://archive.org/details/georgianstories10000mich ''Georgian Stories''] ( Putnam's Sons, 1925)
*[https://archive.org/details/londonventure00sevigoog/page/n10/mode/2up ''The Green Hat. A romance for a few people''] (W. Collins Sons & Co., 1926)
*[https://archive.org/details/youngmeninlove0000mich/page/n7/mode/2up ''Young Men in Love''] (Hutchinson, 1927)
*[https://archive.org/details/lilychristinerom0000mich ''Lily Christine''] (Doubleday, Doran, 1929)
*''Men Dislike Women'' (Heinemann, 1931)
*''Man's Mortality'' (Heinemann, 1933)
*[https://archive.org/details/in.ernet.dli.2015.209057/page/n7/mode/2up ''Hell! Said the Duchess''] (Heinemann, 1934)
*''[[The Flying Dutchman (novel)|The Flying Dutchman]]'' (Heinemann, 1939)

===Short stories===
*''The Romantic Lady'' (Collins, 1921)
*[https://archive.org/details/in.ernet.dli.2015.41194/page/n7/mode/2up ''These Charming People''] (Collins, 1923) (15 thematically connected short stories)
*''May Fair, In Which Are Told the Last Adventures of These Charming People'' (Collins, 1925)
*''Ghost Stories'' (Collins, 1927)
*''Babes in the Wood'' (Hutchinson, 1930)
*[https://archive.org/details/crookedcoronetot0000mich/page/n9/mode/2up ''The Crooked Coronet. And other misrepresentations of the real facts of life''] (Heinemann, 1937)
*''The Ancient Sin and Other Stories'' (Collins, 1930) (collection)
*''The Short Stories of Michael Arlen'' (Collins, 1933) (collection)
*''The Great Book of Mystery'' (Odhams, undated circa 1930s) - contains "The Ghoul of Golders Green"

==Notes==
{{notelist}}

==References==
{{Reflist}}

==Further reading==
*Michael J. Arlen, ''Exiles'', Pocket, New York: 1971. (Biographical book of Arlen and his wife viewed from the perspective of Arlen's son. Includes details of Arlen's final years in New York, his writer's block, and his death).
*Michael J. Arlen, ''Passage to Ararat'', Hungry Mind, Saint Paul: 1996. (On Arlen's ethnic identity and his son's quest for his lost Armenian roots. During this quest, Arlen's son tries to explain why his father preferred to live "free" from the Armenians.)
*Harry Keyishian, ''Michael Arlen'', Twayne, Boston: 1975. (Critical review of Arlen's oeuvre. Contains a detailed bibliography.)
*Philip Ward, ''Encounters with Michael Arlen'', Troubador, Market Harborough: 2023. (Biographical essays on Arlen. Includes a detailed chronology and a listing of his extant letters.)
*Alec Waugh, "What Happened to Michael Arlen?", ''Harper's Monthly Magazine'', 210:1257 (1955:Feb.)

==External links==
{{wikisource author|Michael Arlen}}
{{Commons category|Michael Arlen}}
;Digital collections
* {{StandardEbooks|Standard Ebooks URL=https://standardebooks.org/ebooks/michael-arlen}}
* {{Gutenberg author | id=40583| name=Michael Arlen}}
* {{FadedPage|id=Arlen, Michael|name=Michael Arlen|author=yes}}
* {{Internet Archive author |sname=Michael Arlen}}

;Physical collections
*[https://norman.hrc.utexas.edu/fasearch/findingAid.cfm?eadID=00653 Michael Arlen Collection] at the [[Harry Ransom Center]]
*[http://www.npg.org.uk/live/search/person.asp?LinkID=mp06330 Author photographs] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20081121230027/http://www.npg.org.uk/live/search/person.asp?LinkID=mp06330 |date=21 November 2008 }} from the [[National Portrait Gallery, London]]

;Other databases
* {{isfdb name|112213}}
* {{LCAuth|n50001591|Michael Arlen|44|ue}}
*{{IMDb name|0035158}} List of Arlen's film productions as a scriptwriter

;Other links
*[https://web.archive.org/web/20080616152453/http://www.shepherdmarket.co.uk/history.htm Shepherd Market — where Arlen lived and used as the setting for '''The Green Hat''']
*[https://web.archive.org/web/20101121065023/http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,719548,00.html Dikran Kuyumjian], [[Time magazine]]

{{Authority control}}
{{The Falcon}}
{{Use dmy dates|date=October 2019}}
{{Use British English|date=July 2015}}

{{DEFAULTSORT:Arlen, Michael}}
[[Category:1895 births]]
[[Category:1956 deaths]]
[[Category:English male novelists]]
[[Category:People from Ruse, Bulgaria]]
[[Category:People educated at Malvern College]]
[[Category:Alumni of the University of Edinburgh]]
[[Category:British people of Armenian descent]]
[[Category:British horror writers]]
[[Category:Bulgarian people of Armenian descent]]
[[Category:Ghost story writers]]
[[Category:20th-century English novelists]]
[[Category:20th-century English male writers]]