: Anthony Hope (1863-1933) is the pen-name of Sir Anthony Hope Hawkins, novelist and playwright. He was born in London in 1863. After winning a scholarship to Oxford, he became a barrister in 1887 and at the same time embarked on a writing career, beginning by cintributing articles to various periodicals. Hope,s first book, A Man of Mark, was published in 1890. Four years later he gave up his practice at the Bar in order to write full time, and in April of the same year, he produced The Prisoner of Zenda. It was an immediate success. Hope also wrote many other novels, historical romances, short stories and plays. Although his plays are now forgotten, he is still particularly remembered for his two novels set in Ruritania, the second of which, Rupert of Hentzau (1898), follows the further adventures of Rudolf Rassendyll, the hero and narrator of The Prisoner of Zenda. His linked short stories entitled The Dolly Dialogues, which were reprinted from the Westminster Gazette in 1894, are still admired for their witty description of late-Victorian hig h society that is now overlaid with period charm. Anthony Hope was knighted in1918 and died in 1933. The Prisoner of Zenda has remained a popular novel for hubdred years: the land of Ruritania has now taken its place on the maps of English fiction, having inspired countless swashbuckling imitators in both literature and film.