Researching Martin West

Martin West studied at Balliol College, Oxford, before joining the British East India Company. He served in Bombay but had to retire on grounds of ill-health and became Resident Magistrate in Grahamstown, South Africa.

From this post, he was appointed the first Lieutenant-Governor and the first civilian administrator of the Colony of Natal in 1845, still a dependency of the Cape.

Joyce's short biographical entry describes him as "a moderate administrator, …(who) suffered from poor health and, ill-supported by the British government, … achieved negligible progress during his term of office". He was retired from the Natal governorship in 1849 and died that year.

Durban's West Street and the suburb of Westville are named after him. Westville Boys' High School also has a school house called West that is named after him.

West wrote on ancient Greek music, Greek tragedy, Greek lyric poetry, the relations between Greece and the ancient Near East, and the connection between shamanism and early ancient Greek religion, including the Orphic tradition. This work stems from material in Akkadian, Phoenician, Hebrew, Hittite, and Ugaritic, as well as Greek and Latin. West also studied the reconstitution of Indo-European mythology and poetry and its influence on Ancient Greece, notably in the 2007 book Indo-European Poetry and Myth (IEPM).

In 2001, he produced an edition of Homer's Iliad for the Bibliotheca Teubneriana, accompanied by a study of its critical tradition and overall philology entitled Studies in the Text and Transmission of the Iliad. A further volume on The Making of the Iliad appeared ten years later, and one on The Making of the Odyssey was published in 2014.

West played doctor Phil Brewer in General Hospital and Don Hughes in As the World Turns. His work also includes appearances in films including Soldier Blue and Mac and Me and as guest star in television programs including Perry Mason, The Lieutenant, Rango, The Invaders, and Matlock. West's final TV acting appearance was in an episode of The New Adam-12 before being retired from acting in 1990.

On Broadway, West portrayed a Union soldier in The Andersonville Trial (1959).

After he moved to Westport, Connecticut, West acted and directed with the Theatre Artists Workshop and produced a documentary about older artists from that area.

In 1967, West married Carol A. Heller and remained wed until her death in 1971. Marrying Carolyn K. Barsky in 1975, West had his first of three children. The two later divorced in 1979.

On New Years Eve 1980, West married actress Suzie Galler after meeting her on the set of Der Preis fürs Überleben, a film in which they co-starred. They had two children together before making the move from Los Angeles to Connecticut in 1993, ultimately divorcing in 1997. The following year, West met artist Ann Chernow at a mutual friend's party. Ann remained his partner until his death.

On December 31, 2019, West died in Norwalk Hospital at age 82.