Mary Ann Caws is an American author, art historian and literary critic.

She is currently a Distinguished Professor of English, French and Comparative Literature at the Graduate School of the City University of New York. She is an expert on Surrealism

Surrealism

Surrealism is a cultural movement that began in the early 1920s, and is best known for the visual artworks and writings of the group members....

 and modern English

Modern English

Modern English is the form of the English language spoken since the Great Vowel Shift in England, completed in roughly 1550.Despite some differences in vocabulary, texts from the early 17th century, such as the works of William Shakespeare and the King James Bible, are considered to be in Modern...

 and French literature, having written biographies of Marcel Proust

Marcel Proust

Valentin Louis Georges Eugène Marcel Proust was a French novelist, critic, and essayist best known for his monumental À la recherche du temps perdu...

, Virginia Woolf

Virginia Woolf

Adeline Virginia Woolf was an English author, essayist, publisher, and writer of short stories, regarded as one of the foremost modernist literary figures of the twentieth century....

, and Henry James

Henry James

Henry James, OM was an American-born writer, regarded as one of the key figures of 19th-century literary realism. He was the son of Henry James, Sr., a clergyman, and the brother of philosopher and psychologist William James and diarist Alice James....

. She works on the interrelations of visual art and literary texts, has written biographies of Pablo Picasso

Pablo Picasso

Pablo Diego José Francisco de Paula Juan Nepomuceno María de los Remedios Cipriano de la Santísima Trinidad Ruiz y Picasso known as Pablo Ruiz Picasso was a Spanish expatriate painter, sculptor, printmaker, ceramicist, and stage designer, one of the greatest and most influential artists of the...

 and Salvador Dalí

Salvador Dalí

Salvador Domènec Felip Jacint Dalí i Domènech, Marquis de Púbol , commonly known as Salvador Dalí , was a prominent Spanish Catalan surrealist painter born in Figueres,Spain....

, edited the diaries, letters, and source material of Joseph Cornell. She has also written on André Breton

André Breton

André Breton was a French writer and poet. He is known best as the founder of Surrealism. His writings include the first Surrealist Manifesto of 1924, in which he defined surrealism as "pure psychic automatism"....

, Robert Desnos

Robert Desnos

Robert Desnos , was a French surrealist poet who played a key role in the Surrealist movement of his day.- Biography :...

, René Char

René Char

René Char was a 20th century French poet.-Biography:Char was born in L'Isle-sur-la-Sorgue in the Vaucluse department of France, the youngest of four children of Emile Char and Marie-Therese Rouget, where his father was mayor and managing director of the Vaucluse plasterworks...

, Yves Bonnefoy

Yves Bonnefoy

Yves Bonnefoy is a French poet and essayist. Bonnefoy was born in Tours, Indre-et-Loire, the son of a railroad worker and a teacher....

, Robert Motherwell

Robert Motherwell

Robert Motherwell American painter, printmaker and editor. He was one of the youngest of the New York School , which also included Jackson Pollock, Mark Rothko, Willem de Kooning, and Philip Guston....

, and Edmond Jabès

Edmond Jabes

----Edmond Jabès was a Jewish writer and poet, and one of the best known literary figures to write in French after World War II.- Life :...

. She served as the senior editor for the HarperCollins World Reader, and edited anthologies on Manifestos - Isms, Surrealism, Twentieth Century French Literature. Among others, she has translated Stéphane Mallarmé

Stéphane Mallarmé

Stéphane Mallarmé , whose real name was Étienne Mallarmé, was a French poet and critic. He was a major French symbolist poet, and his work anticipated and inspired several revolutionary artistic schools of the early 20th century, such as Dadaism, Surrealism, and Futurism.-Biography:Stéphane...

, Tristan Tzara

Tristan Tzara

Tristan Tzara was a Romanian and French avant-garde poet, essayist and performance artist. Also active as a journalist, playwright, literary and art critic, composer and film director, he was known best for being one of the founders and central figures of the anti-establishment Dada movement...

, Pierre Reverdy

Pierre Reverdy

Pierre Reverdy was a French poet associated with surrealism and cubism.Pierre Reverdy was born in Narbonne and grew up near the Montagne Noire in his father's house. Reverdy came from a family of sculptors. His father taught him to read and write. He studied at Toulouse and Narbonne.Reverdy...

, André Breton

André Breton

André Breton was a French writer and poet. He is known best as the founder of Surrealism. His writings include the first Surrealist Manifesto of 1924, in which he defined surrealism as "pure psychic automatism"....

, Paul Éluard

Paul Éluard

Paul Éluard, born Eugène Émile Paul Grindel , was a French poet who was one of the founders of the surrealist movement.-Biography:...

, Robert Desnos

Robert Desnos

Robert Desnos , was a French surrealist poet who played a key role in the Surrealist movement of his day.- Biography :...

, and René Char

René Char

René Char was a 20th century French poet.-Biography:Char was born in L'Isle-sur-la-Sorgue in the Vaucluse department of France, the youngest of four children of Emile Char and Marie-Therese Rouget, where his father was mayor and managing director of the Vaucluse plasterworks...

.

Among the positions she has held are President, Association for Study of Dada and Surrealism, 1971-75 and President, Modern Language Association of America

Modern Language Association

The Modern Language Association of America is the principal professional association in the United States for scholars of language and literature...

, 1983, Academy of Literary Studies, 1984-5, and the American Comparative Literature Association

American Comparative Literature Association

The American Comparative Literature Association is the principal learned society in the United States for scholars whose work connects several different literary traditions and cultures or that examines the premises of cross-cultural literary study...

, 1989-91.

In October 2004, she published her autobiography, To the Boathouse: a Memoir (University Alabama Press), and in November 2008, a cookbook memoir: "Provencal Cooking: Savoring the Simple Life in France" (Pegasus Books).

She was married to Peter Caws

Peter Caws

Peter J. Caws is a British American philosopher and administrator, and University Professor of Philosophy and Professor of Human Sciences at the George Washington University.- Biography :...

 and is the mother of Hilary Caws-Elwitt and of Matthew Caws

Matthew Caws

Matthew Caws is the lead singer of the band Nada Surf. His parents are Peter Caws and Mary Ann Caws.- Biography :...

, lead singer of the band Nada Surf

Nada Surf

Nada Surf is an American alternative rock band. Formed in 1992, the New York band consists of Matthew Caws , Ira Elliot and Daniel Lorca .-Early years:...

. She is married to Dr. Boyce Bennett; they live in New York City.

External links

• Mary Ann Caws Homepage