Laurence Kelly (born 1933) is an
English writer. He was born in
Brussels, the son of a
diplomat
A diplomat (from grc, δίπλωμα; romanized ''diploma'') is a person appointed by a state or an intergovernmental institution such as the United Nations or the European Union to conduct diplomacy with one or more other states or internati ...
father
Sir David Kelly and his wife
Marie-Noële (née de Vaux). He was educated at
Downside and
New College, Oxford
New College is one of the constituent colleges of the University of Oxford in the United Kingdom. Founded in 1379 by William of Wykeham in conjunction with Winchester College as its feeder school, New College is one of the oldest colleges at th ...
where he got a scholarship to study history. He first visited
Moscow in 1950, where his father was serving as the British
ambassador
An ambassador is an official envoy, especially a high-ranking diplomat who represents a state and is usually accredited to another sovereign state or to an international organization as the resident representative of their own government or sov ...
. Serving in the
Life Guards, he learnt Russian and became an army interpreter. He also served in the
Foreign Office
Foreign may refer to:
Government
* Foreign policy, how a country interacts with other countries
* Ministry of Foreign Affairs, in many countries
** Foreign Office, a department of the UK government
** Foreign office and foreign minister
* Unit ...
in the mid-1950s.
As a writer, he wrote acclaimed biographies of two important Russian figures from the early 19th century:
Mikhail Lermontov and
Alexander Griboyedov. He won the
Cheltenham Prize for ''Lermontov: Tragedy in the Caucasus''. He has also edited literary anthologies on Moscow,
St Petersburg
Saint Petersburg ( rus, links=no, Санкт-Петербург, a=Ru-Sankt Peterburg Leningrad Petrograd Piter.ogg, r=Sankt-Peterburg, p=ˈsankt pʲɪtʲɪrˈburk), formerly known as Petrograd (1914–1924) and later Leningrad (1924–1991), i ...
and
Istanbul.
Bio
/ref> He was married to the historian Linda Kelly who died in 2019.
References
{{DEFAULTSORT:Kelly, Laurence
English biographers
1933 births
Living people