J. G. Farrell

James Gordon Farrell, known as J. G. Farrell, was a Liverpool-born novelist of Irish descent. After the Second World War, his family moved to Dublin, and from this point on Farrell spent much time in Ireland. In 1956, during his first term at Oxford, he contracted polio, which nearly killed him and left him permanently weakened. Following his graduation, he went to work as a teacher in France where his first novel, A Man from Elsewhere (1963), is set. Farrell is chiefly known for his Empire Trilogy (Troubles, The Siege of Krishnapur and The Singapore Grip), which deals with the political and human consequences of British colonial rule. Farrell's career abruptly ended when he drowned in a fishing accident at the age of 44.
Troubles received the 1971 Geoffrey Faber Memorial Prize and The Siege of Krishnapur won the 1973 Booker Prize. In 2010, Troubles was retrospectively awarded the Lost Man Booker Prize, created to recognise works published in 1970 ( Troubles and its fellow shortlisted works had not been open for consideration that year due to a change in the eligibility rules).