TH White

 TH (Terence) White was a British author who wrote Arthurian novels in the 20th century and his works were the basis for the musical Camelot. He was known as Tim. 

He was born in India, in 1906 to a middle class couple, who were not very good parents. His father was an alcoholic and his  mother was cold to him.  He went to school in England then became a teacher at Stowe school. At college, he wrote a thesis on Malory and was interested in his version of the Arthurian legend- .  But he worked at Stowe for several years and then gave up teaching after producing a memoir about his time in England which gave him a start as a writer.  In 1937,  he read Malory and then produced his first Arthurian work, The Sword in the Stone, which was an account of Arthurs boyhood, being trained by Merlin the wizard. He found a cottage where he lived in the woods, learning about ancient crafts like falconry, and enjoying hunting and fishing.  He also took an interest in aviation.  He was prone to rather obsessive interests and worked these into his writing about Arthur, but he also was more or less a pacifist.  With war looming, he moved to Ireland as he did not wish to take part in the war, and in the books he wrote he worked in Arthur's attempts to move from solving disputes by force to solving them by legal means.   He lived out the war years in Ireland, and afterwards he moved to Alderney in the Channel Islands and continued writing.  

His works were popular and sparked public interest in the Arthurian legends.  his books sold well and he also wrote some fantasy/Science fiction novels.. and books about training hawks. His personal life wasnt very happy, though he was so successful as a writer.  He seems to have been a homosexual, but with his background he could not cope with this part of his nature.  He had few friends and does not seem to have had a romantic partnership ever.  In the late 1950s Lerner and Loewe used his books to write the musical Camelot which was extremely popular in America particularly after Jackie Kennedy said that her husband liked it.. and the President's time in office, was referred to as Camelot after his tragic death.

White died on a cruise, in 1964 and was buried in Greece. In his later years, he had taken to drinking heavily.....  He had a rather difficult life but his works were seminal Arthurian literature.