Eleanor Clark

Eleanor Clark
Born(1913-07-06)July 6, 1913
Los Angeles, California
DiedFebruary 16, 1996(1996-02-16) (aged 82)
Boston, Massachusetts
OccupationAuthor
LanguageEnglish
NationalityAmerican
Notable worksThe Oysters of Locmariaquer (1964)
Notable awardsNational Book Award
SpouseRobert Penn Warren
ChildrenRosanna Warren, Gabriel Warren
Website
nationalbook.org/people/eleanor-clark

Eleanor Clark (1913 – 1996) was an American writer and "master stylist," best known for her non-fiction accounts.[1][2][3][4]

Background

Eleanor Clark was born on July 6, 1913, in Los Angeles, California, but grew up in Roxbury, Connecticut.[1][4] She attended Vassar College in the 1930s, where she met Mary McCarthy.[3][4]

Career

Clark was involved with the literary magazine Con Spirito there, along with Elizabeth Bishop, Mary McCarthy, and her sister Eunice Clark. She also associated with Herbert Solow and helped translate documents for the 1937 "trial" of Leon Trotsky.[4]

During World War II, Clark worked in the Office of Strategic Services (OSS) in Washington, DC.[4]

Clark wrote reviews, essays, children's books, and novels.[1]

Personal life and death

In the late 1930s, Clark married Jan Frankel, a secretary of Trotsky; they divorced by the mid-1940s.[4] In 1952, Clark married Robert Penn Warren and lived in Fairfield, Connecticut, with him and their two children, Rosanna and Gabriel.[1]

On February 16, 1996, Clark died age 82 in Boston, Massachusetts.[1]

Awards

Works

For her book The Oysters of Locmariaquer (1964),[6] Clark received the U.S. National Book Award in the short-lived category Arts and Letters.[1][5]

When Rome and the Villa was reissued, Anatole Broyard called it "perhaps the finest book ever to be written about a city."[1]

Clark wrote about her experiences with the CPUSA and Trotskyites in at least two fictionalized accounts, Bitter Box (1946) and Gloria Mundi (1979).[4]

Novels:

  • Bitter Box (1946)[7][8]
  • Baldur's Gate (1970)[9]
  • Song of Roland (1960)[10]
  • Dr. Heart: A Novella and Other Stories (1974)[11]
  • Gloria Mundi: A Novel (1979)[12]

Nonfiction:

  • Rome and a Villa (1952)[13]
  • Oysters of Locmariaquer (1964)[14]
  • Eyes, Etc.: A Memoir (1977)[15]
  • Tamrart: 13 Days in the Sahara (1984)[16]
  • Camping Out (1986)[17]

Translations:

See also

References

  1. ^ a b c d e f g Thomas, Robert McG. Jr. (February 19, 1996). "Eleanor Clark is Dead at 82 - A Ruminative Travel Essayist". The New York Times. Retrieved May 30, 2010.
  2. ^ Kunitz, Stanley (1955). Twentieth Century Authors: A Biographical Dictionary of Modern Literature. Supplement, Volume 1. H. W. Wilson. p. 203. Retrieved July 24, 2019.
  3. ^ a b c d "Eleanor Clark". National Book Foundation. Retrieved July 24, 2019.
  4. ^ a b c d e f g Wald, Alan M. (1987). The New York Intellectuals: The Rise and Decline of the Anti-Stalinist Left from the 1930s to the 1980s. UNC Press Books. pp. 246–248. ISBN 9780807841693. Retrieved January 20, 2019.
  5. ^ a b "Oysters of Locmariaquer". National Book Foundation. Retrieved March 10, 2012.
  6. ^ Warren, Rosanna (August 2024). "My Mother's Oysters". Harper's. Vol. 349, no. 2021.
  7. ^ Clark, Eleanor (1946). Bitter Box. Doubleday. Retrieved July 24, 2019.
  8. ^ "Bitter Box". Kirkus. April 4, 1946. Retrieved July 24, 2019.
  9. ^ Clark, Eleanor (1970). Baldur's Gate. Pantheon. Retrieved July 24, 2019.
  10. ^ Clark, Eleanor (1960). Song of Roland. Random House. Retrieved July 24, 2019.
  11. ^ Clark, Eleanor (1974). Dr. Heart: A Novella and Other Stories. Pantheon. ISBN 9780394494111. Retrieved July 24, 2019.
  12. ^ Clark, Eleanor (1979). Gloria Mundi: A Novel. Pantheon. ISBN 9780394505367. Retrieved July 24, 2019.
  13. ^ Clark, Eleanor (1952). Rome and a Villa. Doubleday. Retrieved July 24, 2019.
  14. ^ Clark, Eleanor (1964). Oysters of Locmariaquer. Pantheon. Retrieved July 24, 2019.
  15. ^ Clark, Eleanor (1977). Eyes, Etc.: A Memoir. Pantheon. Retrieved July 24, 2019.
  16. ^ Clark, Eleanor (1984). Tamrart: 13 Days in the Sahara. S. Wright. ISBN 9780913773154. Retrieved July 24, 2019.
  17. ^ Clark, Eleanor (1986). Camping Out. Putnam. ISBN 9780399131226. Retrieved July 24, 2019.
  18. ^ Sender, Ramón José (1943). Dark Wedding. Translated by Eleanor Clark. Doubleday, Doran. Retrieved July 24, 2019.
Wikiquote has quotations related to Eleanor Clark.
  • Eleanor Clark Papers. Yale Collection of American Literature, Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library.