novelist and industrialist whose sophisticated satires mirrored the changing class structure in post-World War II English society. After completing his education at Eton and Oxford, he entered the family business, an engineering firm in Birmingham; he worked his way up to become the firm's managing director in London. During this time he produced his laconically titled social comedies, Blindness (1926), Living (1929), Party Going (1939), Caught (1943), Loving (1945), Back (1946), Concluding (1948), Nothing (1950), and Doting (1952). Underlying the pleasant surfaces of the novels are disturbing and enigmatic perceptions. An early autobiography, Pack My Bag, was published in 1943.