David Wheldon

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David Wheldon (1950 - 7 January 2021) was an English writer and medical doctor.

Contents

Biography

David Wheldon was born in 1950 in the mining village of Moira, Leicestershire. He went to the Quaker school at Sidcot, Somerset, and graduated in medicine from Bristol University. He was the author of four novels, a short story collection, and several collections of poetry. He was married to the artist Sarah Longlands. He died unexpectedly at his Bedford home in January 2021 at the age of seventy. [1]

Writing

Wheldon's first novel The Viaduct won the Triple First Award in 1983. The judges were Graham Greene and William Trevor. It was a runner-up in The Whitbread Award. It was republished in the USA and widely reviewed. [1]

His first three novels are often described as allegorical and Kafkaesque. [2] [3] [4] Wheldon has written that he first read Kafka after completing The Viaduct and an early version of A Vocation. [5]

He published several volumes of poetry with The Berkeleyan Eye, [6] a publishing house set up with his wife the artist Sarah Longlands. The books are illustrated with her drawings, with poems individually illustrated in the volumes Uncompliant Stranger and Days and Orders. [7]

After a couple of decades with no published fiction, from 2017 his short fiction began to appear in The Woven Tale Press, Confingo, and Nightjar Press. [8] His short story collection The Guiltless Bystander was published by Confingo Publishing in July 2022. [9]

His personal website contains several uncollected short stories, essays, and poems. [10]

His first two novels The Viaduct and The Course of Instruction were reissued by Valancourt in November 2024. [11] [12]

Medical career

At Bristol he had made a special study of the disease Multiple Sclerosis. In 2002 his wife, the artist Sarah Longlands, suddenly had difficulty walking and was diagnosed with MS. [13] Wheldon published research on an antibiotic treatment of the disease, [14] [15] and claims to have successfully treated his wife. [13] He began to treat others with what became known as "The Wheldon Protocol". [16] [17]

Bibliography

Novels

Poetry

Short stories

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References

  1. 1 2 "Award-winning novelist David Wheldon dies, aged 70". The Bookseller. Retrieved 2022-06-21.
  2. ↑ Lockwood, David (March 2021). "Signs of Kafka in David Wheldon's Novels". ResearchGate. doi:10.13140/RG.2.2.26399.84645.
  3. ↑ Januszczak, Waldemar (1984-04-03). "Meridian, David Wheldon's Course of Instruction". BBC Sounds. BBC Sounds.
  4. ↑ Jordan, Elaine (1983-04-21). "Travelling". London Review of Books. Vol. 05, no. 7. ISSN   0260-9592 . Retrieved 2022-06-29.
  5. ↑ "Kafka and Dickens: the unconscious made public". www.davidwheldon.co.uk. Retrieved 2022-06-21.
  6. ↑ "David Wheldon Books". 2022-06-29.
  7. ↑ Longlands, absolutearts com, Sarah. "Sarah Longlands, Footsteps In The Snow". absolutearts.com / wwar.com. Retrieved 2022-06-21.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link)
  8. ↑ O'Reilly, Aiden (April 2017). "RE:fresh David Wheldon". The Stinging Fly. 2 (36). ISBN   9781906539627.
  9. ↑ "Confingo Publishing". CŌNFINGŌ PUBLISHING. Archived from the original on 2022-06-21. Retrieved 2022-06-21.
  10. ↑ Wheldon, David (2022-06-21). "David Wheldon poet, novelist, pathologist". Archived from the original on 2022-06-21. Retrieved 2022-06-21.
  11. ↑ "The Viaduct (1983)". Valancourt Books. Retrieved 2025-01-18.
  12. ↑ "The Course of Instruction (1984)". Valancourt Books. Retrieved 2025-01-18.
  13. 1 2 "Seeking a cure for Multiple Sclerosis" (PDF). Sidcotian Friends (Autumn, Winter 2015): 12, 13. 2015-11-01.
  14. ↑ Wheldon, David B.; Stratton, Charles W. (2006-11-01). "Multiple sclerosis: an infectious syndrome involving Chlamydophila pneumoniae". Trends in Microbiology. 14 (11): 474–479. doi:10.1016/j.tim.2006.09.002. PMID   16996738.
  15. ↑ Wheldon, David B.; Stratton, Charles W. (2007-10-01). "Antimicrobial treatment of multiple sclerosis". Infection. 35 (5): 383–385. doi:10.1007/s15010-007-7036-5. PMID   17882356. S2CID   39176800.
  16. ↑ Ntatsaki, Eleana; Watts, Richard A. (2010-02-04). "Management of polymyalgia rheumatica". BMJ. 340: c620. doi:10.1136/bmj.c620. ISSN   0959-8138. PMID   20133367. S2CID   9343105.
  17. ↑ "Wheldon Protocol | Cpnhelp.org". cpnhelp.org. Retrieved 2022-06-29.
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