Kenneth Lamott

Kenneth Lamott
Born
Kenneth Church Lamott

(1923-04-08)April 8, 1923
Tokyo, Japan
DiedAugust 18, 1979(1979-08-18) (aged 56)
Bolinas, California, U.S.
Occupations
  • Novelist
  • non-fiction writer
  • essayist
  • screenwriter
Notable workScience in Action
ChildrenAnne Lamott

Kenneth Church Lamott (April 8, 1923 – August 18, 1979) was an American writer.[1]

Early life and education

Lamott spent his childhood in Japan, where his father was a Presbyterian missionary. The family returned to the United States in 1938 after Lamott had spent two years at the American School in Japan. Lamott graduated from Montclair High School in Montclair, New Jersey, and began studies in engineering at Yale in 1940.[2] He left during World War II and joined the Navy with the rank of Lieutenant. After attending the US Navy Japanese/Oriental Language School at the University of Colorado at Boulder,[3] he was assigned to interrogate Japanese prisoners of war. Following the War, he returned to Yale, where he received a degree in English. He married Dorothy Wyles in 1946, with whom he had three children. He worked for the State Department until 1951, then moved to California, where he taught part-time at San Quentin Prison while writing his first book.[1]

Career

Lamott's first novel, The Stockade, was about a group of Marines guarding prisoners confined within a stockade, and their interaction with the indigenous people on an Island in the Pacific as the war ends.[4]

Lamott wrote other novels and non-fiction books. He also had other projects, Killing the Whale, which was not published and The Great Big New Rich, which was published in 1970.[5] He wrote many articles for Harper's, Horizon magazine, The New York Times Magazine, The New Yorker, Newsweek, and Yale Review. He also wrote for Contact magazine, which he edited in the early 1960s. He was a screenwriter of television scripts, including Science in Action.[1]

Personal life and death

During the 1960s and 1970s, Lamott lived in Tiburon, California[6] and, in his later years, Bolinas, California. He divorced in 1974 and died in Bolinas on August 18, 1979.[1]

He was the father of American novelist and non-fiction writer Anne Lamott.

Bibliography

Novels

  • The Stockade (1952, Little Brown)[7][8]
  • The White Sand of Shirahama (1954, Little Brown)[9][10][11]
  • The Bastille Day Parade (1967, D. McKay Co.)[12]

Non-fiction

  • Chronicles of San Quentin: the biography of a prison. (1961, D. McKay Co.)
  • Who killed Mr. Crittenden?: being a true account of the notorious murder that stunned San Francisco--the Laura D. Fair case (1963, D. McKay Co.)[6]
  • The Moneymakers (1969, Little Brown)[13]
  • Anti-California; report from our first parafascist state (1971, Little Brown)
  • Escape from Stress: How to stop killing yourself (1974, Putnam)

Newspaper and magazine articles

  • "In the Matter Of H. Bruce Franklin," The New York Times, January 23, 1972[14]

References

  1. ^ a b c d Saxon, Wolfgang (August 21, 1979). "Kenneth Lamott, West Coast Literary Figure, Dies". The New York Times. Retrieved 6 August 2019.
  2. ^ "Principal Lists Leading Pupils". The Montclair Times. Montclair, New Jersey. June 28, 1940. pp. 12, 24. Retrieved 6 August 2019.
  3. ^ Martin, Harris I. "Jish" (June 1, 2004). "The 1942 Winter Group". The Interpreter. No. 76. Archives, University of Colorado at Boulder Libraries. The US Navy Japanese/Oriental Language School Archival Project.
  4. ^ "Books - Authors". New York Times. 3 January 1952. ProQuest 112252729.
  5. ^ http://www.uwyo.edu/ahc/_files/pdffa/07711.pdf [bare URL PDF]
  6. ^ a b Keown, Don (November 19, 1963). "Colorful Chapter Of S.F. History Told By Tiburonite". Daily Independent Journal. Retrieved 6 August 2019.
  7. ^ Falk, Ray (8 June 1952). "Behind the Barbed Wire: The Stockade (book review)". New York Times. ProQuest 112501578.
  8. ^ Snyder, Marjorie (8 June 1952). "Lieutenant Does His Duty And Story Ends in Horror (book review)". Washington Post. ProQuest 152505105.
  9. ^ Morgan, Constance (8 August 1954). "Sex and Religion Cause Explosion At Beach Resort: The White Sand of Shirahama (book review)". Washington Post. ProQuest 148544384.
  10. ^ Espy, John (18 July 1954). "Codes and Consequence (book review)". New York Times. ProQuest 113092293.
  11. ^ Jackson, Henry Joseph (14 July 1954). "Bookman's Notebook (book review)". Los Angeles Times. ProQuest 166639376.
  12. ^ Lask, Thomas (January 24, 1967). "Books of The Times". The New York Times. p. 31. Retrieved 6 August 2019.
  13. ^ Rolo, Charles (8 June 1969). "The Rich Are Different-- from what they used to be (book review)". Chicago Tribune. ProQuest 175971156.
  14. ^ "In the Matter Of H. Bruce Franklin". The New York Times. January 23, 1972. p. SM12. Retrieved 6 August 2019.