[1] Later in life he would become music critic on The World, taking the place of George Bernard Shaw.

[1][6] Hichens was also friends with several other writers, including E. F. Benson and Reggie Turner,[6] as well as the composer Maude Valérie White.

[7] Hichens's first big success was An Imaginative Man (1895); set in the city of Cairo, Egypt, a place which fascinated Hichens, it is a study of insanity, in which the hero becomes dangerously obsessed with the Great Sphinx.

A. Cuddon called it "outstanding" and compared it with "The Horla" by Guy de Maupassant and "The Beckoning Fair One" by Oliver Onions.

[8] Hichens's Felix (1902), is an early fictional treatment of hypodermic morphine addiction, while The Garden of Allah (1904) sold well internationally,[1] and was made into a film three times.