Lewis Leary

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Lewis Gaston Leary (born April 18, 1906 in Blauvelt , New York , † May 1, 1990 in Chapel Hill , North Carolina ) was an American literary scholar.

Life

Leary first studied at the University of Vermont ( BA 1928), at the Graduate School of Columbia University he obtained an MA degree in 1931 and received his Ph.D. He began teaching as early as 1928 in Lebanon at the American University of Beirut (1928–1931). 1935–1941 he taught English literature at the University of Miami . He then moved to Duke University (1941–1951), but was initially released after the United States entered World War II and worked for the Office of Strategic Services until the end of the war . From 1951 to 1968 he taught at Columbia University; from 1962 to 1968 he was chairman of the department for English literature. From 1968 until his retirement in 1976 he taught as William Rand Kenan Professor of English at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill .

Leary's research focus was on American literature of the 18th and 19th centuries; Among other things, he published works on Ralph Waldo Emerson , Herman Melville , Henry David Thoreau and John Greenleaf Whittier , and his biography Philip Freneau , published in 1941 ( That Rascal Freneau ), is still considered a standard work to this day .

Works (selection)

  • That Rascal Freneau: A Study in Literary Failure . Rutgers University Press, Brunswick, NJ 1941.
  • The Literary Career of Nathaniel Tucker, 1750-1807 . Duke University Press, Durham NC 1951.
  • Motive and Method in The Cantos of Ezra Pound . Columbia University Press, New York 1954.
  • Washington Irving . University of Minnesota Press, Minneapolis 1955.
  • Mark Twain . University of Minnesota Press, Minneapolis 1960 (= University of Minnesota Pamphlets on American Writers 5).
  • John Greenleaf Whittier . Twayne, New York 1961 (= Twayne's United States Authors Series 6).
  • Norman Douglas . Columbia University Press, New York 1968.
  • Southern Excursions: Essays on Mark Twain and Others . Louisiana State University Press, Baton Rouge 1971, ISBN 080710938X .
  • William Faulkner of Yoknapatawpha County. Crowell, New York 1973, ISBN 0690891733 .
  • Soundings: Some Early American Writers . University of Georgia Press, Athens GA 1975, ISBN 082030350X .
  • Ralph Waldo Emerson: An Interpretive Essay . Twayne, Boston 1980. ISBN 0805790128 .
  • The Book-peddling Parson: An Account of the Life and Works of Mason Locke Weems, Patriot, Pitchman, Author, and Purveyor of Morality to the Citizenry of the Early United States of America . Algonquin Books, Chapel Hill NC 1984, ISBN 0912697091 .

Web links

personal data
SURNAME Leary, Lewis
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Leary. Lewis Gaston (full name)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION American literary scholar
DATE OF BIRTH April 18, 1906
PLACE OF BIRTH Blauvelt , New York
DATE OF DEATH May 1, 1990
Place of death Chapel Hill, North Carolina