Brian
Moore was born on 25 August 1921, in Belfast. His father,
James Brian Moore FRCS, was a distinguished physician and
devout Catholic. Moore was the second son of nine children,
and the family lived in a grand house on Clifton Street. The
local Orange order headquarters were located directly opposite
their house.
Moore often quoted Francois Mauriac, who believed that the
door closes at twenty for the writer because by then the writer's
way of seeing and responding to events has already been determined
by the forces and circumstances of their childhood.
As
a young boy in the nursery at home, he used his vivid imagination
to entertain his sisters by telling stories. In school he
displayed a talent for essay writing - he used to earn himself
sixpence for writing essays for his school friends.
Moore attended St Malachy's Grammar school, a fee-paying establishment
for bright, middle-class Catholic boys. Despite pressures
to conform, he was seen as a bright, independent and free-minded
thinker. Moore left school in 1939, having failed his senior
exams. He later criticised his schooling through his novels
The Feast of Lupercal and
The Emperor of Ice
Cream.
Introduction
