Humphrey Carpenter

Humphrey Carpenter (1946–2005) was an English biographer, author, and radio broadcaster.

Carpenter was born, died, and lived practically all of his life, in the city of Oxford. On leaving the Dragon School in Oxford, Carpenter studied at Marlborough College in Wiltshire, but returned to study English at Keble. During his appointment at BBC Radio Oxford, Humphrey met his future wife, Mari Prichard. They married in 1973.

His notable output of biographies included: J. R. R. Tolkien (1977) (also editing of The Letters of J. R. R. Tolkien), The Inklings (1978), W. H. Auden (1981), Ezra Pound (1988), Evelyn Waugh (1989), Benjamin Britten (1992), Robert Runcie (1997), and Spike Milligan (2004). His Mr Majeika series of children's books enjoyed considerable popularity and were successfully adapted for television. His encyclopedic work The Oxford Companion to Children's Literature (1984), written jointly with his wife, became a standard reference source.