Leslie Poles Hartley was born in Whittlesey, Cambridgeshire, in 1895 and educated at Harrow and Balliol College, Oxford.
During World War I was a young officer in the British army, but will never go to the front. Since 1923 and for thirty years he worked as a tireless literary critic in periodicals such as Spectator, Saturday Riview, Sketch, Observer and Time and Tide. He published his first book, a collection of short stories entitled Night Fears in 1924.
The Shrimp and the Anemone, his first novel, did not appear until 1944 as the first volume of a trilogy which was followed by The Sixth Heaven (1946) and Eustace and Hilda (1947), which was immediately recognized as the greatest contribution to English fiction contemporary. Among his novels include The Boat (1949) and The Go-Between, The Messenger (1953), the latter won the Heinemann Foundation Prize of the Royal Society of Literature in 1954. Later, the film version of his novel the Hireling, directed by Alan Bridges, won first prize at the Cannes Film Festival 1973.
In 1967 he published The Novelistsí Responsibility, a collection of critical essays. His latest books include My Sisteris Keeper (1970), Mrs Carteret Receives (1971) and The Harness Room (1971). L. P. Hartley died in 1972.
Lord David Cecil described him as "one of the most distinguished modern storytellers, and one of the most original".