The Empty Chair | Alice and Claude Askew | A Bitesized Audiobook

A young couple take their honeymoon in the Lake District, where the bride suggests her husband has “a day off duty" walking the fells. When he loses his way, he seeks aid at a remote and desolate looking house...  but could Fate have brought him here?

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00:00:00 Introduction
00:01:20 The Empty Chair
00:42:23 Credits, thanks and further listening

Claude Askew (1865–1917) and Alice Askew (née Leake, 1874–1917) were a husband and wife writing team, who achieved tremendous popular success together in the Edwardian era, collaborating on numerous novels and short stories which appeared frequently in the periodicals of the day.

They were both born in London. Claude was educated at Eton, while the details of Alice's education are obscure. Alice apparently stated that she began writing "for her own amusement" before marrying Claude, although only one story is known to be credited to her under her own name (Alice Jane de Courcy Leake): 'A Modern-Day Saint', which was printed in 'Belgravia' magazine in 1894.  Claude and Alice married  in July 1900 and initially lived in the Marylebone area of London, where their son and older daughter were born. They later moved out to Godalming in Surrey, and eventually Haywards Heath in Sussex.

It appears that they began their writing partnership soon after their marriage; short stories were printed under their joint names from 1903 onwards, and their first novel, 'The Shulamite', was published in 1904. According to a profile of the couple from the 'Review of Reviews' in 1912: "About a year after they had been married it occurred to them that it would be pleasant to work together, since their tastes were so strikingly similar. They began with short stories, in which they have been as successful as they have been prolific, and contributed practically a new story every week to Household Words."

Interestingly, given the plot of 'The Empty Chair', it's said that both Claude and Alice often found their ideas for stories as a result of dreams. Typically, if Claude dreamed up a plot, he would write the first half of the story, while Alice finished it and improved it; and the reverse would be the case when Alice dreamed up her plots.

The Askews were well-known celebrities of the day by the time of the outbreak of the First World War in 1914. Although they were both in their forties by this point, they volunteered to help the war effort. After some time in Belgium assisting an ambulance station in late 1914/early 1915, they returned to Britain and published at least two novels, 'The Tocsin' (1915) and 'Nurse!' (1916), drawing upon their wartime experiences. Later in the war they took up the cause of aid for Serbia, raising funds in London as well as travelling to the eastern Mediterranean to write about and document experiences in the region. Alice spent some time working with the Serbian Red Cross, while Claude was appointed an honorary Major in the Serbian army in recognition of his support.

As they worked together and achieved success together, so Alice and Claude Askew died together, casualties of war when the ship they were travelling on was struck by a torpedo fired by a German U-boat in the Adriatic. They were sailing on the Città di Bari, en route to Corfu, when the ship sank at about 4.30am on 6 October 1917. Claude's body was never recovered, but Alice's body was washed up on the tiny Croatian island of Zvirinovik some weeks later, identified by letters and telegrams found in her clothing. As a result she was buried in Karbuni and a stone cross and memorial was erected in her memory there.

Alice and Claude were survived by their three children, the youngest of whom was aged just one, having been born in London in July 1916.

'The Empty Chair' first appeared in The Pall Mall Magazine in September 1910.

Recording © Bitesized Audio 2023