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Roy Horniman
The Author behind Israel Rank: The Autobiography of a Criminal
 

Born in 1868 in England, Robert Horniman began his early childhood diving into acting and journalism. Coming from a middle class family, he was to be working from an early age jumpstarting his career as he sought theatre and entertainment as an escape from reality. 

From a young age, Robert found comfort in his original writings. Although he had his works taken away by his mother in his early teens, this did not stop his determination for his talent of writing.

Before getting too deep into the theatre and film work, he had the idea to go by "Roy" as he felt going by "Roy" would be better for the professional area of work. 

For his acting career, he played a number of works at West End theatres including, Romeo and Juliet, Uncle Thatcher, and Hamlet. 

While acting, he began to call himself "an established writer" starting with short stories then moving onto larger works into plays and then later full works of books and novels. 


 

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From publishing his first novel, The Sin of Atlantis, he then produced a three-act play John Lester, Parson, and quickly move on to adapting my novels before finally moving towards publishing his own writings.

In 1903, he published two novels, The Living Buddha and That Fast Miss Blount, followed by Bellamy the Magnificent in 1904.

In 1907, Horniman published A Nonconformist Parson, Lord Cammarleigh's Secret: A Fairy Story of To-Day, and Israel Rank: The Autobiography of a Criminal. 

Outside of the entertainment industry, Horniman was a frequent visitor to Blue Cross Funds during the first few years of World War I. He would treat sources that were badly wounded in battle. Horniman was also a chairman of the Soldier and Sailors' Tobacco Fund, an organization that would send tobacco to British armed forces. 

Over the years, Horniman would produce, writer, and act in many plays, films, and movies that would showcase the start of many influential actors and producers at the time. This including:

- Billie Burke, known popular for Glinda in The Wizard of Oz - 1938)

- Eliot Stannard, writing over 400 known silent films from 1914-1933

- Alan Crosland, directing the first feature film with sound effects and musical soundtrack - 1926 

 

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(Above) August 18, 1900

A Review for The Athenaeum on Horniman's first Novel
The Sin of Atlantis


 

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