Charles Montagu Doughty

1843 - 1926

English author and traveler in Arabia.

Born in Suffolk to an Anglican cleric, Charles Montagu Doughty studied geology at Cambridge University. Motivated by a desire to examine ancient inscriptions and to explore the origins of humanity in what he considered its primitive setting, from 1876 to 1878 he traveled among the bedouin, whom he considered the original people. Though dressed and living as a simple wanderer in central and western Arabia, he never disguised himself as a native. He was the first literary traveler openly to proclaim his Englishness and never to deny his Christianity, to the point of imagining himself a Christlike figure.

In undertaking his voyage, Doughty benefited from Europe's economic and political penetration of the Middle East. But as he approached what he believed was the beginning of time, that very world of wealth, industry, and capital was interfering with his quest. Remote Anaizah in Central Arabia was by now the home to merchants who discussed Otto von Bismarck and Czar Alexander and life under English rule in Bombay. Hundreds of Najdis had gone down to Egypt "to dig for wages in the work of the Suez Canal," which Doughty called "this moral quagmire."

The result of his labor, Travels in Arabia Deserta, published in 1888, did not gain popular success until after World War I. T. E. Lawrence, whose Seven Pillars of Wisdom had made him an international literary star, rescued Doughty's book from neglect by arranging for a handsome second edition, which he endorsed with a ten-page introduction. Doughty also wrote patriotic poetry but, unlike his champion, he played little role in public affairs.

Bibliography

Doughty, Charles M. Travels in Arabia Deserta, 2 vols. Cambridge, U.K.: Cambridge University Press, 1888.

Hogarth, D. G. The Life of Charles M. Doughty. Garden City, NY: Doubleday, Doran, 1929.

— BENJAMIN BRAUDE

For other persons named Charles Doughty, see Charles Doughty (disambiguation).

Charles Montagu Doughty (1843 – 1926) was an English poet, writer, and traveller born in Theberton Hall, Saxmundham, Suffolk and educated at private schools and at a school for the royal navy, Portsmouth. He was a student at King's College London, eventually graduating from Gonville and Caius College, Cambridge in 1864.^[1]

He is best known for his 1888 travel book Travels in Arabia Deserta, a work in two volumes which, though it had little immediate influence upon its publication, slowly became a kind of touchstone of ambitious travel writing, one valued as much for its language as for its content. T. E. Lawrence rediscovered the book and caused it to be republished in the 1920s, contributing an admiring introduction of his own. Since then the book has gone in and out of print.

The book is a vast recounting of Doughty's treks through the Arabian deserts, and his discoveries there. It is written in an extravagant and mannered style, largely based on the King James Bible, but constantly surprising with verbal turns and odd inventiveness.

Among authors who have praised the book are the British novelist Henry Green, whose essay on Doughty, "Apologia," is reprinted in his collection Surviving. Green's novel Living arguably shows some direct stylistic influence of Doughty's book.^{[unreliable source?]}

Works

• Travels in Arabia Deserta (1888)
• The Dawn in Britain (1906)
• Adam Cast Forth (1908)
• The Cliffs (1909)
• The Clouds (1912)
• The Titans (1916)
• Mansoul or The Riddle of the World (1920)

References and further reading

1. ^ Doughty, Charles Montagu in Venn, J. & J. A., Alumni Cantabrigienses, Cambridge University Press, 10 vols, 1922–1958.

• Cousin, John W. A Short Biographical Dictionary of English Literature. 1910.
• Taylor, Andrew (1999). God's Fugitive: The Life of Charles Montagu Doughty. Hammersmith; London: HarperCollins Publishers. ISBN 0002558157 (hardcover). 
• Hogarth, D.G. The Life Of Charles M. Doughty. 1928
• Kirk, John Foster A Supplement to Allibone's Critical Dictionary of English Literature and British and American authors 1891
• Wanderings In Arabia arranged & introduced by Edward Garnett. Duckworth & Co 1908.
• Passages From Arabia Deserta selected by Edward Garnett. Jonathan Cape 1931.

External links

• Charles Montagu Doughty at Find a Grave

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