
Joseph Hilaire Pierre Rene Belloc (1870-1953) was one of the most prolific writers in England during the early twentieth century. His best travel writing has secured a permanent following. The Path to Rome (1902), an account of a walking pilgrimage he made from central France across the Alps and down to Rome, has remained continuously in print. More than a mere travelogue, The Path to Rome contains descriptions of the people and places he encountered, his drawings in pencil and in ink of the route, humour, poesy, and the reflections of a large mind turned to the events of his time as he marches along his solitary way. At every turn, Belloc shows himself to be profoundly in love with Europe and with the Faith that he claims has produced it. Two of his best known non-fiction works are The Servile State (1912) and Europe and Faith (1920).
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1870–1953
Joseph Hilaire Pierre René Belloc was born in La Celle-Saint-Cloud, France, the son of a French father, who was an attorney, and an English mother, who was an author. In 1872, his father died in 1872, leaving the family destitute, and his mother moved with Belloc to Slindon, West Sussex, where he spent most of his childhood. He was educated at John Henry Newman's Oratory School in Edgbaston, Birmingham, and then volunteered to serve in the French Army. He was posted in an artillery regiment near Toul in 1891. After his release from the military, he studied history at Oxford University, graduating in 1895. In 1896, he married Elodie Hogan, an American, and published his first book, a book of poetry called Verses and Sonnets. In 1906 he and his family moved to Shipley, West Sussex, where he lived until just before he died. He went into politics, and was a Liberal Party Member of Parliament for Salford South from 1906-1910. In 1914, the year his wife Elodie died of influenza, he took a position as edited of the war journal Land and Water, where he stayed until 1920. In 1918, his son Louis was killed while serving in the Royal Flying Corps in France. Belloc suffered a stroke in 1941, from which he never recovered.
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