Richard Burton Popular Books
Richard Burton Biography & Facts
Richard Burton (; born Richard Walter Jenkins Jr.; 10 November 1925 – 5 August 1984) was a Welsh actor. Noted for his mellifluous baritone voice, Burton established himself as a formidable Shakespearean actor in the 1950s and gave a memorable performance as Hamlet in 1964. He was called "the natural successor to Olivier" by critic Kenneth Tynan. Burton's perceived failure to live up to those expectations disappointed some critics and colleagues; his heavy drinking added to his image as a great performer who had wasted his talent. Nevertheless, he is widely regarded as one of the finest actors of his generation. Burton was nominated for an Academy Award seven times but never won. He was nominated for his performances in My Cousin Rachel (1952), The Robe (1953), Becket (1964), The Spy Who Came In from the Cold (1965), Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf? (1966), Anne of the Thousand Days (1969) and Equus (1977). He received numerous accolades, including a BAFTA Award, a Golden Globe Award and a Grammy Award. He received the Tony Award for Best Actor in a Musical for his portrayal of King Arthur in the Lerner and Loewe musical Camelot (1960). In the mid-1960s, Burton became a top box-office star. By the late 1960s, he was one of the highest-paid actors in the world, receiving fees of $1 million or more plus a share of the gross receipts. Burton remained closely associated in the public mind with his second wife, Elizabeth Taylor. The couple's turbulent relationship, married twice and divorced twice, was rarely out of the news. Early life Childhood Burton was born Richard Walter Jenkins Jr. on 10 November 1925 in a house at 2 Dan-y-bont in Pontrhydyfen, Glamorgan, Wales. He was the twelfth of thirteen children born into the Welsh-speaking family of Richard Walter Jenkins Sr. (1876–1957), and Edith Maude Jenkins (née Thomas; 1883–1927). Jenkins Sr., called Daddy Ni by the family, was a coal miner, while his mother worked as a barmaid at a pub called the Miner's Arms in the village, where she met and married her husband. According to biographer Melvyn Bragg, Richard is quoted saying that Daddy Ni was a "twelve-pints-a-day man" who sometimes went off on drinking and gambling sprees for weeks, and that "he looked very much like me". Jenkins Sr. was badly burned in a mining explosion and his father Thomas had been confined to a wheelchair after a mining accident. He remembered his mother to be "a very strong woman" and "a religious soul with fair hair and a beautiful face". Richard was barely two years old when his mother died on 31 October, six days after the birth of Graham, the family's thirteenth child. Edith's death was a result of postpartum infections; Richard believed it occurred because of "hygiene neglect". According to biographer Michael Munn, Edith "was fastidiously clean", but her exposure to the dust from the coal mines resulted in her death. Following Edith's death, Richard's elder sister Cecilia, whom he affectionately addressed as "Cis", and her husband Elfed James, also a miner, took him under their care. Richard lived with Cis, Elfed and their two daughters, Marian and Rhianon, in their three bedroom terraced cottage on 73 Caradoc Street, Taibach, a suburban district in Port Talbot, which Bragg describes as "a tough steel town, English-speaking, grind and grime". Richard remained forever grateful and loving to Cis throughout his life, later going on to say: "When my mother died she, my sister, had become my mother, and more mother to me than any mother could ever have been ... I was immensely proud of her ... she felt all tragedies except her own". Daddy Ni would occasionally visit the homes of his grown daughters but was otherwise absent. Another important figure in Richard's early life was Ifor, his brother, 19 years his senior. A miner and rugby union player, Ifor "ruled the household with the proverbial firm hand". He was also responsible for nurturing a passion for rugby in young Richard. Although Richard also played cricket, tennis, and table tennis, biographer Bragg notes rugby union football to be his greatest interest. On rugby, Richard said he "would rather have played for Wales at Cardiff Arms Park than Hamlet at The Old Vic". The Welsh rugby union centre, Bleddyn Williams believed Richard "had distinct possibilities as a player". From the age of five to eight, Richard was educated at the Eastern Primary School while he attended the Boys' segment of the same school from eight to twelve years old. He took a scholarship exam for admission into Port Talbot Secondary School in March 1937 and passed it. Biographer Hollis Alpert notes that both Daddy Ni and Ifor considered Richard's education to be "of paramount importance" and planned to send him to the University of Oxford. Richard became the first member of his family to go to secondary school. He displayed an excellent speaking and singing voice since childhood, even winning an eisteddfod prize as a boy soprano. Whilst a pupil at Port Talbot Secondary School, Richard also showed immense interest in reading poetry as well as English and Welsh literature. He earned pocket money by running messages, hauling horse manure, and delivering newspapers. Philip Burton years Richard was bolstered by winning the Eisteddfod Prize and wanted to repeat his success. He chose to sing Sir Arthur Sullivan's "Orpheus with his Lute" (1866), which biographer Alpert thought "a difficult composition". He requested the help of his schoolmaster, Philip Burton, but his voice cracked during their practice sessions. This incident marked the beginning of his association with Philip. Philip later recalled, "His voice was tough to begin with but with constant practice it became memorably beautiful." Richard made his first foray into theatre with a minor role in his school's production of the Irish playwright George Bernard Shaw's The Apple Cart. He decided to leave school by the end of 1941 and work as a miner as Elfed. He was not fit enough, owing to illness. He worked for the local wartime Co-operative committee, handing out supplies in exchange for war-time ration-coupons. He also simultaneously considered other professions for his future, including boxing, religion and singing. It was also during this period that Richard took up smoking and drinking despite being underage. When he joined the Port Talbot Squadron 499 of the Air Training Corps section of the Royal Air Force (RAF) as a cadet, he re-encountered Philip, who was the squadron commander. He also joined the Taibach Youth Centre, a youth drama group founded by Meredith Jones and led by Leo Lloyd, a steel worker and avid amateur thespian, who taught him the fundamentals of acting. Richard played the role of an escaped convict in Lloyd's play, The Bishop's Candlesticks, an adaptation of a section of Victor Hugo's Les Misérables. The play did not have any dialogue, but Alpert noted that Richard "mimed his role". Philip gave him a part in a radio documentary/ad.... Discover the Richard Burton popular books. Find the top 100 most popular Richard Burton books.
Best Seller Richard Burton Books of 2024
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Hellraisers
Robert SellersThe Boozy Biography of the Four Greatest Actors to Ever Walk–Or Stagger–Into a Pub.Set in the dazzling world of cinema, Hellraisers paints the raw and riveting profiles of four ill...
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Elizabeth Taylor, a Passion for Life
Joseph PapaFrom the time she appeared in National Velvet, the film that skyrocketed her to international fame at age twelve in 1944, until her death, Elizabeth Taylor's beauty, allure, and pe...
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Hollywood Hellraisers
Robert Sellers'I don't know what people expect when they meet me. They seem to be afraid that I'm going to piss in the potted palm and slap them on the ass.' Marlon Brando'I should have been dea...
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The English Girl
Katherine WebbFrom Sunday Times Top Ten bestselling author, Katherine Webb, The English Girl is perfect for fans of Dinah Jefferies, Kate Morton and Santa Montefiore.In a land full of secrets, y...
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Selected Writings
Gerard De NervalPoet, visionary, shortstory writer and autobiographer, Gérard de Nerval (18081855) explored the uncertain borderlines between dream and reality, irony and madness, autobiography an...
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Essays and Letters
Friedrich Hölderlin, Charlie Louth & Jeremy AdlerOne of Germany's greatest poets, Johann Christian Friedrich Hölderlin (17701843) was also a prose writer of intense feeling, intelligence and perception. This new translation of se...
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The War of the Worlds
H.G. WellsCOMING TO BBC ONE IN AUTUMN 2019! 'No one would have believed in the last years of the nineteenth century that this world was being watched keenly and closely by intelligences grea...
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Arabian Nights
Richard F. BurtonThe REAL deal no mere selection, ALL 171 Arabian Tales 10 volumes in 1! 2000 pages+ of stories ... Unabridged. Aladdin's Wonderful Magic Lamp, Ali Baba and the Forty Thieves, the...
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The Collected Tales of Nikolai Gogol
Nikolai Gogol, Richard Pevear & Larissa VolokhonskyUsing, or rather mimicking, traditional forms of storytelling Gogol created stories that are complete within themselves and only tangentially connected to a meaning or moral. His w...
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An A-Z of Hellraisers
Robert SellersAn AZ of Hellraisers is the last word on inebriated misbehaviour, and the miscreant mob in this whopper of a book constitute the most amazing grouping to see print: from Alexander ...
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The Richard Burton Diaries
Richard Burton & Chris WilliamsIrresistibly magnetic on stage, mesmerizing in movies, seven times an Academy Award nominee, Richard Burton rose from humble beginnings in Wales to become Hollywood's most highly p...
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The Life of Sir Richard Burton
Thomas WrightIn these pages Burton will be seen on his travels, among his friends, among his books, fighting, writing, quarrelling, exploring, joking, flying like a squib from place to placea 1...
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Erotic Vagrancy
Roger Lewis'One of the very best biographies I have ever read' STEPHEN FRY'A hot thunderstorm of a book' DAVID HARE'Erotic Vagrancy gave me a week of pure joy' CRAIG BROWN'Unputdownable' TONY...
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The Pillow Book
Sei Shonagon & Meredith McKinneyA new translation of the idiosyncratic diary of a C10 court lady in Heian Japan. Along with the TALE OF GENJI, this is one of the major Japanese Classics.
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First Footsteps in East Africa or an Exploration of Harar
Sir Richard Francis BurtonAccording to Wikipedia: "Captain Sir Richard Francis Burton KCMG FRGS (19 March 1821 – 20 October 1890) was a British explorer, translator, writer, soldier, orientalist, ethnologis...
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The Arabian Nights
Sir Richard Francis Burton & A S ByattFull of mischief, valor, ribaldry, and romance, The Arabian Nights has enthralled readers for centuries. These are the tales that saved the life of Shahrazad, whose husband, the ki...
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Richard Burton
John DileoRichard Burton is excerpted from Tennessee Williams and Company: His Essential Screen Actors by John DiLeo. The essay focuses on Richard Burton’s roles in the films The Night of th...
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Furious Love
Sam Kashner & Nancy SchoenbergerFrom veteran entertainment reporter Sam Kashner and biographer Nancy Schoenberger comes the definitive account of the greatest Hollywood love story ever toldthe romance of Elizabet...
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Richard Burton
Michael MunnThe whirlwind life of one of old Hollywood’s biggest stars.From the depths of a small mining village in Wales to a star of Hollywood’s silver screen, Richard Burton broke every rul...
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Selected Political Speeches
Cicero & Michael GrantAmid the corruption and power struggles of the collapse of the Roman Republic, Cicero (10643BC) produced some of the most stirring and eloquent speeches in history. A statesman and...
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The Life of Sir Richard Burton, both volumes in a single file
Thomas WrightAccording to Wikipedia: "Captain Sir Richard Francis Burton KCMG FRGS (19 March 1821 – 20 October 1890) was a British explorer, translator, writer, soldier, orientalist, ethnologis...
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The Explorers Guild
Kevin Costner, Jon Baird & Rick RossReturn to the golden age of adventure with this gorgeously wrought, actionpacked, globetrotting tale that combines the bravura storytelling of Kipling with the irresistible, illust...
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Riverworld
Philip José FarmerFrom awardwinning author Philip Jose Farmer comes his most famous science fiction work: the first combined edition of the first two Riverworld novels, To Your Scattered Bodies Go a...
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Furious Love
Sam Kashner & Nancy SchoenbergerA tough Welshman, he was softened by the affections of a breathtakingly beautiful woman: she was a modernday Cleopatra madly in love with her own Mark Antony. For quarter of a cent...
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First Footsteps in East Africa
Sir Richard Francis BurtonFirst Footsteps in East Africa by Sir Richard Francis Burton: "First Footsteps in East Africa" by Sir Richard Francis Burton is a travel narrative that chronicles Burton...
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The Diary of Lady Murasaki
Murasaki ShikibuThe Diary recorded by Lady Murasaki (c. 973c. 1020), author of The Tale of Genji, is an intimate picture of her life as tutor and companion to the young Empress Shoshi. Told in a s...
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Elizabeth and Michael
Donald BogleDiscover the unique, profound, and unlikely yet enduring friendship between two of the most prominent and beloved celebrities of all timeElizabeth Taylor and Michael Jacksonin this...
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Russian Black Magic
Natasha HelvinA rare look into the history, theory, and craft of the black mages and sorcerers of Russia Examines practical rituals and spells, the demonic pantheon, places of power, offerings ...
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Dudley Moore
Rena FruchterRena Fruchter was Dudley's concert piano partner, and the friend who looked after him in the final years of his life until his death at the age of 66. This is her intimate portrait...
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Sir Richard Burton
Fawn M. BrodieSir Richard Burton was best known as an intrepid explorer with a voracious appetite for adventure who penetrated the sacred cities of Mecca and Medina and was the first European to...
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The Dangerous Book of Heroes
Conn Iggulden & David IgguldenConn Iggulden, coauthor of the phenomenally successful The Dangerous Book for Boys, and David Iggulden now bring us The Dangerous Book of Heroesfeaturing great stories of courage a...
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Richard Burton
Michael Munn‘ After reading this affectionately candid biography, it is hard not to echo Olivier’ s response on hearing of Burton’ s death: “ He...
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Selected Letters
Madame SevigneOne of the world's greatest correspondents, Madame de Sévigné (162696) paints an extraordinarily vivid picture of France at the time of Louis XIV, in eloquent letters written throu...
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A Dedication to Sir Richard Francis Burton
Various AuthorsSir Richard Francis Burton KCMG FRGS (1821–1890) was a British writer, poet, linguist, explorer, translator, geographer, ethnologist, orientalist, Freemason, diplomat, and cartogra...
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Liz
C. David HeymannElizabeth Taylor's own story was more dramatic than any part she ever played on the screen. C. David Heymann brings her magnificently to life in this acclaimed biographyupdated wit...
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The Zulus at War
Adrian Greaves & Xolani MkhizeBy tracing the long and turbulent history of the Zulus from their arrival in South Africa and the establishment of Zululand, The Zulus at War is an important and readable addition ...
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Brad and Angelina
Chas Newkey-BurdenBrad Pitt and Angelina Jolie are the bestknown and most talkedabout couple in the world. When they got together in 2005 it made headlines worldwide everyone wanted to know the ful...
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Letters to a Young Poet
Rainer Maria RilkeAt the start of the twentieth century, Rainer Maria Rilke wrote a series of letters to a young officer cadet, advising him on writing, love, sex, suffering and the nature of advice...
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Personal Narrative of a Pilgrimage to Al-Madinah and Meccah, both volumes in a single file
Sir Richard Francis BurtonAccording to Wikipedia: "Captain Sir Richard Francis Burton KCMG FRGS (19 March 1821 – 20 October 1890) was a British explorer, translator, writer, soldier, orientalist, ethnologis...
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Elizabeth Taylor
Kitty Kelley“Shimmering in blue sequins and periwinkle eye shadow, Elizabeth Taylor strode onto the stage of the Mark Hellinger Theater to present the 1981 Antoinette Perry Award for Broadway’...
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The Affair
Gill PaulLOVE. GLAMOUR. SECRETS.Rome, 1961. As the cameras roll on Cleopatra, the world is transfixed by the love affair emerging between Hollywood’s biggest stars: Richard Burton and Eliza...
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Military Dispatches
The Duke of WellingtonThe vivid and exciting accounts written from the front line, taking the story of the British war with Napoleon from its desperate beginnings in Portugal to the final triumph at Wat...
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The Magic Labyrinth
Philip José FarmerReissued to follow the Syfy Channel film of Riverworld, this fourth book in the classic Riverworld series continues the adventures of Samuel Clemens and Sir Richard Francis Burton ...
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The Zulus at War
Adrian Greaves & Xolani MkhizeBy tracing the long and turbulent history of the Zulus from their arrival in South Africa and the establishment of Zululand, The Zulus at War is an important and readable addition ...
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Elizabeth and Monty
Charles CasilloVioleteyed siren Elizabeth Taylor and classically handsome Montgomery Clift were the most gorgeous screen couple of their time. Over two decades of friendship they made, separately...