F. W. Dupee
Encyclopedia
F. W. Dupee was a highly distinguished American literary critic, essayist for Partisan Review and the New York Review of Books, and professor emeritus of English at Columbia University
. He was an eminent scholar of Henry James, and also wrote on contemporary poetry, fiction, and American culture. Dupee edited editions of Austen, Dickens, Gertrude Stein, and Leon Trotsky. He made the transition from being a radical Marxist who mainly wrote political essays to being one of the most well-respected literary critics of his time. Dupee died of a drug overdose in 1979.
and the literary editor of the New Masses. By 1937 he had had become disillusioned with the Party, although he maintained his socialist thought and activism for the rest of his life.
Columbia University
Columbia University in the City of New York is a private, Ivy League university in Manhattan, New York City. Columbia is the oldest institution of higher learning in the state of New York, the fifth oldest in the United States, and one of the country's nine Colonial Colleges founded before the...
. He was an eminent scholar of Henry James, and also wrote on contemporary poetry, fiction, and American culture. Dupee edited editions of Austen, Dickens, Gertrude Stein, and Leon Trotsky. He made the transition from being a radical Marxist who mainly wrote political essays to being one of the most well-respected literary critics of his time. Dupee died of a drug overdose in 1979.
Early life and career
Born Frederick Wilcox Dupee in Chicago on June 25, 1904, he was the son of Leroy Church and Frances Wilcox Dupee. He earned his Ph.B degree at Yale University in 1927 and taught at Bowdoin College and Bard College before going to Columbia University in 1948, where he taught modernist literature.Politics
Dupee was a Marxist, and an organizer for the Communist Party in New York City in the mid 1930's. He was a founding editor of the Partisan ReviewPartisan Review
Partisan Review was an American political and literary quarterly published from 1934 to 2003, though it suspended publication between October 1936 and December 1937.-Overview:...
and the literary editor of the New Masses. By 1937 he had had become disillusioned with the Party, although he maintained his socialist thought and activism for the rest of his life.
Selected works
- Henry James for the American Men of Letters Series by F.W. Dupee (1974)
- The Question of Henry James: A Collection of Critical Essays (1947)
- The King of the Cats and Other Remarks on Writers and Writing (1965)- A collection of essays consisting mostly of previously published book reviews.
- The Russian Revolution (1959)