Cecil Lewis

Cecil Lewis (1898 – 1997) was a British fighter ace in the First World War and a flying instructor for the RAF during the Second World War. One of the founding executives of the BBC, he enjoyed friendships with many of the creative figures of the day including George Bernard Shaw, winning an Academy Award for the 1938 film adaptation of Shaw’s Pygmalion. Lewis was a prolific writer and his novel Sagittarius Rising became a classic of First World War literature, considered by many as the definitive account of aerial combat. He retained a passion for flying all his life, and was the last surviving British fighter ace of the First World War.