A writer and painter, noted for his incisive descriptions of people, objects, places and events. Intending to be a painter, he studied at Goldsmiths' School of Art, London. In 1935, at the age of twenty, he was hit by a car and and his spine was fractured, leaving him permanently ill. At this point he took up writing, producing the autobiographical books and short stories for which he is best known.
The white cat Sal-al was lying on the straw matting in the empty conservatory. She looked at us with a wicked, conceited expression as if all her appetites had just been satisfied. She was beautiful. Vesta and I both said, "I wish I were a cat!" Before we got to the last word we smiled at each other in annoyance, not liking the idea that most human beings think very much alike.
I began to long, as I had before, for some special smell, some special music that would fill me, lift me up and carry me away, float me off the rocks of my body and sweep me into some wideness, some vast expanse of blue-grey nothingness. .
