Trivia

A British soldier in World War I, he was wounded on the Somme and his death notice was published in "The London Times". He recovered in a field hospital and dictated a correction to the Times.

Graves wrote several acclaimed historical novels focused on the lives of notable figures from antiquity and the Early Middle Ages. His controversial non-fiction works "The White Goddess" (1948) and "The Greek Myths" (1955) were attempts to analyze ancient myths and to speculate on their historic origins. The works are "widely praised as imaginative and poetic", but Graves' historical theories are seen as "idiosyncratic" , "outlandish", or nonsensical by professional scholars.

He allegedly declined the C.B.E. (Commander of the Order of the British Empire) in 1957 and the Companion of Honor in 1984 for his services to literature.

He can be seen very briefly as an extra in Bryan Forbes' Deadfall (1968), some of which was filmed near his home.

He and Anthony Burgess had a long-standing literary feud, which began when Burgess was still only a student.

His book "The White Goddess" was cited as a major influence on the thinking of the poets Ted Hughes and Sylvia Plath. Plath found herself identifying to some extent with the goddess figure herself.

Graves experienced a serious lung injury while serving in the Battle of the Somme (1916), and he recovered in a military hospital for officers. However, he was incorrectly listed among those killed or fatally wounded in the Battle in official reports of the British casualties.

During his military service in World War I, Graves was suspected of pro-German sympathies. He was falsely rumored to be a relative of the notorious German spy Armgaard Karl Graves, just because they had the same family name.

Lloyd Alexander took the names of some of the characters in his "The Chronicles of Prydain" fantasy novels from Graves' "The White Goddess".

Father: Alfred Perceval Graves; Mother: Amalie (Amy) Elizabeth von Ranke.