Edmund Clerihew Bentley

E. C. Bentley (1875-1956), who is now best remembered as the inventor of the clerihew, was a popular English novelist and humorist of the early twentieth century.

Born in London in 1875, Bentley worked as a journalist on several newspapers, including the Daily Telegraph. His detective novel, Trent's Last Case (1913), was much praised, numbering Dorothy L. Sayers among its admirers. The success of the work inspired him, after only 23 years, to write a sequel, Trent's Own Case(1936). Several of his books have recently been reprinted by House of Stratus [1].

Bentley died in 1956.