Malcolm Cowley

Author and editor Malcolm Cowley was born on August 24, 1898, in Belsano, Pennsylvania. He interrupted his studies at Harvard University for service in World War I, in which he was an ambulance driver for the US Army on the French front.

Became a book reviewer for "The New Republic" in 1919, for which he was later literary editor for 15 years. Was a literary critic, editor, lecturer, journalist, poet and social historian. Wrote introductions to and edited works by F. Scott Fitzgerald, Thornton Wilder and William Faulkner. Met many writers of the "lost generation" of the 1920s, about whom he wrote in "Exile's Return" (1934), which influenced later bohemian movements, and "Second Flowering" (1973). Is credited with being one of the first to recognize the talents of William Faulkner, who was at the time an obscure writer. Was instrumental in getting "beat novelist" Jack Kerouac into print. Was born in what is now the White Mill Hotel in Belsano, PA. Father was a homeopathic physician. Was Chancellor of the American Academy of Arts & Letters from 1966 to 1976. Drove a munitions truck for the French army for several months during WWI, then returned to the United States to continue his interrupted education at Harvard in 1918, and received his bachelors cum laude in 1920.

He returned to Harvard after the war, and graduated in 1920. He then studied at the University of Montpellier in France. He worked for an architectural catalog for a while, then went freelance, contributing book reviews to various magazines and translating the works of several French authors into English.

In 1929 he became associate editor of "The New Republic" magazine and was head of its literary department for 13 years. He wrote the semi-autobiographical "Exile's Return", about the effect of World War I on American writers, such as F. Scott Fitzgerald, and how their experiences in turn affected American literature.

In 1944 he left "The New Republic" and struck out on his own as a writer, although he was a literary advisor to the Viking Press publishing house from 1948. He wrote several books and edited several collections of books by other writers. He became quite in demand as a lecturer at colleges and universities. He was twice president of the National Institute of Arts and Letters, and was a Chancellor of the American Academy of Arts and Letters.

Biography in: "The Scribner Encyclopedia of American Lives". Volume Two, 1986-1990, pages 207-210. New York: Charles Scribner's Sons, 1999.