Bette Lew Sotonoff (1937-01-28)January 28, 1937 Chicago, Illinois, U.S.
Died
December 13, 2017(2017-12-13) (aged 80) Tulsa, Oklahoma, U.S.
Occupation
Writer
literary critic
Spouse
Howard Howland
(m. 1956, divorced)
Children
2
Parents
Sam Sotonoff Jessie Berger
Bette Howland (January 28, 1937 – December 13, 2017) was an American writer and literary critic.[1] She wrote for Commentary Magazine.[2]
Biography
Born Bette Lee Sotonoff to Sam Sotonoff, a machinist, and Jessie Berger, a homemaker, she focused much of her work on her native Chicago, though she left the city in 1975.[3]
In 1956, she married Howard Howland, a biologist. The couple had two sons but later separated and divorced, though she kept his surname.[1] She worked as a librarian and did editorial work for the University of Chicago Press. She was a protegee, and sometime lover of Saul Bellow.[4]
Howland died on December 13, 2017, in Tulsa, Oklahoma, aged 80, while living near one of her sons, the philosopher Jacob Howland.[1]
Critical reappraisal
In 2013 editor Brigid Hughes found Howland's book W-3 and decided to include some of Howland's work in an issue of the literary journal A Public Space dedicated to obscure and forgotten women writers.[5]
