Portal:Literature/Biography archive/2007 archive
This is an archive of biographical article summaries that have appeared in the Biography section of Portal:Literature in 2007. For past archives, see the complete archive page.
In addition to The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings, Tolkien's published fiction includes
As a novelist, Molnár is remembered principally for The Paul Street Boys which tells the story of two rival gangs of youths in Budapest. The novel is a classic of youth literature, beloved in Hungary and abroad for its treatment of the themes of solidarity and self-sacrifice. Molnár's most popular plays are Liliom (1909, tr. 1921), later adapted into the Rodgers and Hammerstein musical play Carousel (1945); The Guardsman (1910, tr. 1924), which served as the basis of the film of the same name (1931); and "The Swan" (1920, tr. 1922).
Eugène Sue (January 20, 1804–August 3, 1857), French novelist, was born in Paris.
He was the son of a distinguished surgeon in Napoleon's army, and is said to have had the Empress Joséphine for godmother. Sue himself acted as surgeon both in the Spanish campaign undertaken by France in 1823 and at the Battle of Navarino (1828). In 1829 his father's death put him in possession of a considerable fortune, and he settled in Paris.
A street in Paris is named for Eugene Sue, in the
Edith Wharton (January 24, 1862 – August 11, 1937) was an American novelist, short story writer, and designer.
Between 1900 and 1937, Wharton wrote many novels; the first to be published was her 1905 masterpiece The House of Mirth, which constitutes the first of many large-scale efforts to expose the oppressive nature and intolerance of her old New York. An admirer of European culture and architecture, Wharton crossed the Atlantic 66 times. From 1907 on, she made her primary residence in France. First, she resided at 58 Rue de Varenne, Paris, in an apartment that belonged to George Washington Vanderbilt II. Then, in 1918, once the chaos of the Great War had subsided, she abandoned her fashionable apartment for the more tranquil Pavillon Colombe, whose erotic history intrigued her immensely, in nearby Saint-Brice-sous-Forêt. And finally, she acquired Sainte-Claire le Château, formerly a convent, in the southern village of Hyères, to which she retreated during the winters and springs.
Her best known work, The Age of Innocence (1920), won the 1921 Pulitzer Prize. She spoke flawless French and many of her books were published in both French and English.
In 1918, when Estonia become independent, Tammsaare had moved to Tallinn. It was here that Tammsaare wrote the works which have gained him a permanent place in Estonian literature. Although Tammsaare took his subjects from the history and life of the Estonian people, his novels have deep connections with the ideas of Bergson, Jung and Freud, and such writers as Knut Hamsun and André Gide.
Tammsaare's early works are characterized by rural "poetic" realism. Some of his stories also reflect the atmosphere of the revolutionary year of 1905. During what is sometimes classified as his second period, from 1908 to 1919, he wrote several short urban novels and collections of miniatures. In "Poiss ja liblik" (1915, The Boy and the Butterfly), Tammsaare shows the influence of Oscar Wilde. Internationally best known is his last novel, Devil with a False Passport.
Georges Simenon (February 13, 1903–September 4, 1989) was a Belgian writer who wrote in French. Simenon was one of the most prolific writers of the twentieth century, capable of writing 60 to 80 pages per day. His oeuvre include nearly 200 novels, over 150 novellas, several autobiographical works, numerous articles, and scores of pulp novels written under more than two dozen pseudonyms. Altogether, about 550 million copies of his works have been printed.
He is best known, however, for his 75 novels and 28 short stories featuring
Wystan Hugh Auden (21 February 1907 – 29 September 1973), who signed his works W. H. Auden (IPA: /ˈwɪstən hjuː ˈɔːdən/; first syllable of Auden rhymes with "law"), was an Anglo-American poet, regarded by many as one of the great writers of the 20th century. His work is noted for its stylistic and technical achievements, its engagement with moral and political issues, and its variety of tone, form, and content.
Throughout his career he was both controversial and influential. After his death, some of his poems, notably "Funeral Blues" ("Stop all the clocks") and "September 1, 1939", became widely known through films, broadcasts, and popular media.
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Louisa May Alcott (November 29, 1832 – March 6, 1888) was an American novelist. She is best known for the novel Little Women, which she wrote in 1868. This novel was loosely based on her childhood experiences with her three sisters. Alcott, along with Elizabeth Stoddard, Rebecca Harding Davis, Anne Moncure Crane, and others, was part of a group of female authors during the U.S. Gilded Age to address women’s issues in a modern and candid manner.
Algernon Blackwood, CBE (March 14, 1869 – December 10, 1951) was an English writer of tales of the supernatural. Although Blackwood wrote a number of horror stories, his most typical work seeks less to frighten than to induce a sense of awe. Good examples are the novels The Centaur, which climaxes with a traveller's sight of a herd of the mythical creatures; and Julius LeVallon and its sequel The Bright Messenger, which deal with reincarnation and the possibility of a new, mystical evolution in human consciousness. His best stories, such as those collected in the book Incredible Adventures, are masterpieces of atmosphere, construction and suggestion.
In
Anatole France (April 16, 1844 – October 12, 1924) was the pen name of French author Jacques Anatole François Thibault. He was born in Paris, France, and died in Tours, Indre-et-Loire, France. Anatole France became known after the publication of Le crime de Sylvestre Bonnard (1881) where he looked back at the 18th century as a golden age. Its protagonist, skeptical old scholar Sylvester Bonnard, embodied France's own personality. The novel was praised for its elegant prose and won him a prize from the French Academy. In La rotisserie de la Reine Pedauque (1893) Anatole France ridiculed belief in the occult; and in Les opinions de Jerome Coignard (1893), France captures the atmosphere of the fin de siècle.
Anthony Trollope (April 24, 1815 – December 6, 1882) became one of the most successful, prolific and respected English novelists of the Victorian era. Some of Trollope's best-loved works, known as the Chronicles of Barsetshire, revolve around the imaginary county of Barsetshire; he also wrote penetrating novels on political, social, and gender issues and conflicts of his day.
Juhan Liiv (30 April 1864–1 December 1913) is one of Estonia's most famous poets. Liiv achieved success in
Sir James Matthew Barrie, 1st Baronet,
Born in Kirriemuir, Angus, the second youngest of ten children, Barrie was educated at the Glasgow Academy and the University of Edinburgh. He became a journalist in Nottingham, then London, and turned to writing novels and subsequently plays.
In September 1835, Emerson and other like-minded intellectuals founded the
Djuna Barnes (June 12, 1892 – June 18, 1982) was an American writer who played an important part in the development of 20th century English language modernist writing by women and was one of the key figures in 1920s and 30s bohemian Paris after filling a similar role in the Greenwich Village of the teens. Her novel Nightwood became a cult work of modern fiction, helped by an introduction by T. S. Eliot. It stands out today for its portrayal of lesbian themes and its distinctive writing style. Since Barnes's death, interest in her work has grown and many of her books are back in print.
Eric Arthur Blair (25 June 1903 – 21 January 1950), better known by the
Hawthorne is best-known today for his many
Luis de Góngora (July 11, 1561 – May 24, 1627) was a Spanish Baroque lyric poet. Gongora, who is considered by many literary scholars the most important Spanish poet of the modern time, came from a noble family. He was born in
Ernest Thayer (August 14, 1863 - August 21, 1940) was an American writer and poet who wrote Casey at the Bat.
Thayer was born in
Richardson had been an established
Robert Fergusson (September 5, 1750 - October 16, 1774), Scottish poet, son of William Fergusson, a clerk in the British Linen Company, was born at Edinburgh.
Portal:Literature/Biography archive/2007, Week 38
Stephen Crane (November 1, 1871 – June 5, 1900) was an American novelist, poet and journalist, best known for the novel Red Badge of Courage. He died at age 28 in Badenweiler, Baden, Germany.
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Elizabeth George Speare (November 21, 1908 – November 15, 1994) was an American children's author who won many awards for her historical fiction novels, including two Newbery Medals. She has been called one of America’s 100 most popular children’s authors and much of her work has become mandatory reading in many schools throughout the nation. Indeed, because her books have sold so well she is also cited as one of the Educational Paperback Association’s top 100 authors.
Portal:Literature/Biography archive/2007, Week 49
Melvil Dewey (December 10, 1851–December 26, 1931) was the inventor of the Dewey Decimal Classification system for library classification.
Dewey was born Melville Louis Kossuth Dewey in Adams Center, New York in the United States. He attended Amherst College, where he was a member of Delta Kappa Epsilon. He graduated in 1874 with a bachelor's degree and received a master's degree from Amherst in 1877. It was while working as an assistant librarian at Amherst from 1874 until 1877 that Dewey devised his system of classifying and cataloguing books by decimal numbers.
Louis Bromfield (December 27, 1896 – March 18, 1956) was an American author and conservationist who gained international recognition winning the Pulitzer Prize and pioneering innovative scientific farming concepts. One of Mansfield, Ohio's most famous natives, his home was Malabar Farm near Lucas, Ohio, from 1939 until his death in 1956. Bromfield was also friends with some of the most celebrated personalities of his era and provided the location for Humphrey Bogart and Lauren Bacall's wedding.