No?l Coward was born in 1899 in Teddington, Middlesex. He made his name as a playwright with "The Vortex" (1924), in which he also appeared. His numerous other successful plays included "Fallen Angels" (1925), "Hay Fever" (1925), "Private Lives" (1933), "Design for Living" (1933) and "Blithe Spirit" (1941). During the war he wrote screenplays such as "Brief Encounter" (1944) and "In Which We Serve" (1942). In the fifties he began a new career as a cabaret entertainer. He published volumes of verse and a novel ("Pomp and Circumstance", 1960), two volumes of autobiography and four volumes of sho...