Lawrence of Arabia, The Authorised Biography

A new edition in progress.

I completed Lawrence of Arabia, The Authorised Biography in 1989. The full text ran to 1,200 pages – around half a million words. It was published in Britain that year by Heinemann, and in the US by Atheneum in 1990. The New York Times Review of Books ranked it among the fourteen best titles of its year. Their reviewer had written: “This biography will endure beside Seven Pillars as his monument, and any future book about T. E. Lawrence will be but a commentary on it”. Malcolm Brown, writing in the London Daily Telegraph, described it as: “the solid sheet-anchor study this subject has long required”. Kirkus Reviews labelled it the “definitive historical biography” (more review comments here).

Unlike some biographies, the text draws extensively on contemporary letters and reports. The narrative is not my personal interpretation of Lawrence’s life, but the story revealed by surviving records. In that sense, the treatment is much more like a TV documentary than a drama – and that is why the content has not gone out of date. No biography written since has taken the same approach, so the book remains unique.

This said, while the record of fact presented in the biography has not changed, there has been further research. Since 1997 I myself have worked on a (continuing) major scholarly edition of Lawrence’s works and letters. Editorial research that focuses on individual texts and relationships has, inevitably, uncovered yet more about Lawrence’s life.

Earlier this year a publisher asked if I would allow a reprint of the biography. The request brought me back to a project I have thought about for some time: the need to review and update the biography in the light of more recent research. With the centenary of WWI approaching and publishing developments such as eBooks and Print on Demand, this is surely the time to do it.

Before starting work, I needed to recover the publishing rights of the original editions. That is now done, so I am free to go ahead.

As it happens, the project fits well with my other plans:

• We are currently working on four more volumes of Lawrence’s post-war correspondence. These, together with the post-war writings already published, provide a good context for reviewing the third part of the biography, ‘Writer and Serviceman’
• During 2012 I hope to finish Letters from Carchemish. That will be a good time to tackle Part I of the biography, ‘Archaeology and Travel’
• During 2012-13, I expect to give much more time to research on the Arab Revolt and the Peace Conference. At the same time I hope to complete Part 2 of the biography, ‘The Years of Conflict’.

The task of reviewing the text, after so long and now from a fresh perspective, turns out to be extremely interesting.