Other Fiction Arlen, Michael: The London Venture. V1. 29 November 2012

[Pulpmeister]

Dikran Kouyoumdjian was an Armenian born in Ottoman Bulgaria in 1895, whose wealthy family fled to Britain in 1901 in the face of the Ottoman persecution of Armenians.

He was educated at Malvern College and after a brief period at Edinburgh University he moved to London to become a writer, adopting the pen name Michael Arlen.

This is his first novel, really an extended short story, or perhaps novella. He achieved fame with his novel "The Green Hat" (1924) exploring aristocratic/bohemian life in twenties London. He was also a very talented short story writer. His somewhat ornate writing style became known as "Arlenesque".

He died in New York in 1956.

I have taken this from the Gutenberg HTML, corrected a few minor typos, and added a Table of Contents and cover.

I have an early hardback copy of The Green Hat (1924) which I hope to scan soon, although as I use a flatbed scanner and ancient OCR software it's a slow and tedious business, and may take some time.