Giles, Frank 1919–

(Frank Thomas Robertson Giles)

PERSONAL: Born July 31, 1919, in London, England; son of F.L.N. (an army officer) and Elgiva (Allen) Giles; married Lady Katharine Pamela Sackville, 1946; children: Sebastian, Sarah, Belinda Giles Dimbelby. Education: Brasenose College, Oxford, M.A., 1946. Religion: Anglican. Hobbies and other interests: Wine (especially claret and burgundy), opera, watercolor painting, visiting his holiday home in northern Corfu, Greece.

ADDRESSES: Home—42 Blomfield Rd., London W9 2PF, England; Bunns Cottage, Lye Green, Crowborough, East Sussex TN6 1UY, England.

CAREER: British Diplomatic Service, London, private secretary, 1945–46; Times, London, England, assistant correspondent in Paris, France, 1947–50, chief correspondent in Rome, Italy, 1950–53, and Paris, 1953–60, foreign editor of Sunday Times, 1961–77, deputy editor, 1967–81, editor, 1981–83. Times Newspapers Ltd., director, 1981–85. Painshill Park Trust, past chair. British Institute, Florence, Italy, member of board of governors. Military service: British Army, 1939–45.

MEMBER: Society of Dilettanti, Brooks's Club, Beefsteak Club.

WRITINGS:

A Prince of Journalists: The Life and Times of Henri Stefan Opper de Blowitz, Faber & Faber (London, England), 1962, Open Court (LaSalle, IL), 1974.

Sundry Times (autobiography), J. Murray (London, England), 1986.

The Locust Years: The Story of the Fourth French Republic, 1946–1958, Secker & Warburg (London, England), 1991, Carroll & Graf (New York, NY), 1994.

(Editor) Corfu: The Garden Isle, presented by Spiro Flamburiari, photographs by Fritz von der Schulenburg and Christopher Simon Sykes, Abbeville Press (New York, NY), 1994.

Napoleon Bonaparte, England's Prisoner, Carroll & Graf (New York, NY), 2001.

SIDELIGHTS: Frank Giles once told CA: "My temporary membership in the Diplomatic Service from 1945 to 1946 as private secretary to Secretary of State Ernest Bevin gave me a lifelong interest in foreign affairs."

Giles more recently told CA: "The favorite among my books is The Locust Years: The Story of the Fourth French Republic, 1946–1958, because a) it is a work of original research and expertise—the result of years of close observation of the French political and social scene; b) it got mostly glowing reviews; and c) it is judged to be eminently readable."

BIOGRAPHICAL AND CRITICAL SOURCES:

PERIODICALS

Times Literary Supplement, September 19, 1986, review of Sundry Times.