Caudwell, Christopher

(pseudonym of Christopher Sprigg). Born Oct. 20, 1908; died Mar. 12, 1937. British author and critic.

In the 1930’s, Caudwell was an initiator of Marxist literary study and criticism in Great Britain. His articles on contemporary writers—published posthumously in Investigations of a Dying Culture (1938) and Further Investigations of a Dying Culture (1950)—had a marked sociological bent. The problems of aesthetics and the theory of poetry are the subjects of Illusion and Reality (1934, published 1937; Russian translation, 1969). Giving a material substantiation to art, Caudwell stressed the biological and psychological bases of creation, particularly criticizing the Freudian interpretation of art. Caudwell was the author of several novels, poems, and stories. He joined the Communist Party of Great Britain in 1935. He fought in the International Brigade in Spain and died in battle.