My brother, Philip Howard, who has died aged 80, was a journalist and prolific author. He trained on the Glasgow Herald, becoming its parliamentary correspondent, before joining the Times in 1964. He went on to become the Times's literary editor for 14 years, a columnist and commentator, and was still writing for the title until a few weeks before his death.

Philip was the son of Peter, a farmer and playwright, and his wife, Doris (nee Metaxa), who won the ladies' doubles finals at Wimbledon in 1932. He attended Cheam school, near Newbury in Berkshire, from where he won a scholarship to Eton – a first for the school. Philip was vice-captain of the school at Eton and a member of the Eton Society or "Pop".

After graduating with a first in classics from Trinity College, Oxford, from 1956 he embarked on his two years' national service. He was proud to have been a lieutenant in the Black Watch and at one time contemplated a military career, but unhappily he was made transport officer of the regiment when it was stationed in Berlin, even though he never drove a car in his life. For more than 50 years, he was content to be chauffeured by his wife, Myrtle (nee Houldsworth), whom he married in 1959 and who died earlier this year.

As a young reporter he was flown to Cairo to cover a story about the Dead Sea Scrolls. My brother and I both inherited a guttural, Greek "r" from our mother, and when he phoned in his copy on a bad line to a copytaker in London, it was typed up as a story about Dead Sea Squirrels. Big stories at the Times included the investiture of Prince Charles as Prince of Wales in 1969, when he wrote his copy by hand and lowered it in takes, in a basket, over the battlements of Caernarfon Castle.

His many books included The Royal Palaces (1970), London's River (1975) and We Thundered Out: 200 Years of the Times (1985). He had a passion for esoteric vocabulary, and his column on language, Lost Words, was for many years a feature of the Times's Saturday edition.

My brother inherited the sporting talent of our father, who captained the England rugby team in 1931: Philip played rugby for the second XV at Oxford. He also kept beagles and jack russells.

He is survived by his children, Jock, a journalist, Juliette, a teacher, and Jamie, and by our sister, Anne, and me.