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Edward Dahlberg

 
 
Columbia Encyclopedia: Edward Dahlberg
Dahlberg, Edward (däl'bərg), 1900-1977, American novelist, critic, and essayist, b. Boston, grad. Columbia, 1925. The illegitimate son of an itinerant hairdresser, he spent much of his childhood in Kansas City. His childhood experiences were recreated in his first novel, Bottom Dogs (1930). Dahlberg lived mostly in Europe. His works include the novels Those Who Perish (1934) and The Olive of Minerva (1976); mystical literary criticism such as Do These Bones Live? (1941); studies of ancient societies such as The Carnal Myth (1968).

Bibliography

See his autobiographical Because I Was Flesh (1964) and The Confessions of Edward Dahlberg (1971); study by H. Billings, ed. (1968).

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Works: Works by Edward Dahlberg
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(1900-1977)

1929Bottom Dogs. The novelist, poet, and essayist's first novel is based on his troubled childhood in an orphanage and his hobo days. D. H. Lawrence, who provides an introduction, praises it for its ability to penetrate the psychology of society's underclass. Dahlberg's use of vernacular language and realistic descriptions would help define the social realism of the 1930s.
1932From Flushing to Cavalry. Dahlberg's second novel continues to draw on his early experiences living in the Flushing section of Queens, New York. His socially realistic style earns him repute as one of the leading proletarian novelists of the decade.
1934Those Who Perish. Dahlberg's third novel is one of the earliest to treat the impact of Nazism on American Jews. It was inspired when Dahlberg was beaten up by uniformed Nazis in a Berlin bar.
1941Do These Bones Live? A volume of literary essays displaying the author's rhapsodic and aphoristic style. It includes criticism of Edgar Allan Poe and Walt Whitman as well as literary modernists such as Ezra Pound and T. S. Eliot. It supports a mythical kind of writing to redeem everyday life. The work would be later revived as Sing O Barren (1947) and Can These Bones Live? (1960).

Quotes By: Edward Dahlberg
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Quotes:

"There is hardly a man on earth who will take advice unless he is certain that it is positively bad."

"Every decision you make is a mistake."

"A strong foe is better than a weak friend."

"Everything ultimately fails, for we die, and that is either the penultimate failure or our most enigmatical achievement."

"Genius, like truth, has a shabby and neglected mien."

"Ambition is a Dead Sea fruit, and the greatest peril to the soul is that one is likely to get precisely what he is seeking."

See more famous quotes by Edward Dahlberg

Wikipedia: Edward Dahlberg
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Edward Dahlberg (July 22, 1900February 27, 1977) was an American novelist and essayist.

Contents

Background

Dahlberg was born in Boston to Elizabeth Dahlberg. Mother and son wandered through the southern and western United States until 1905, when she opened a barber shop in Kansas City. In April 1912 Dahlberg was sent to the Jewish Orphan Asylum, Cleveland, where he lived until 1917. He eventually attended the University of California, Berkeley and Columbia University.

In the late 1920s Dahlberg lived in Paris and in London. His first novel, Bottom Dogs, was published in London with an introduction by D. H. Lawrence. He visited Germany in 1933 and in reaction briefly joined the Communist Party, but left the Party by 1936. From the 1940s onwards, Dahlberg made his living as an author, and also taught at various colleges and universities, most notably Black Mountain College. He married R'Lene LaFleur Howell in 1950.

Dahlberg died in Santa Barbara, California, on February 27, 1977.

Selected works

  • 1929 Bottom Dogs
  • 1932 From Flushing to Calvary
  • 1934 Those Who Perish
  • 1941 Do These Bones Live, essays
  • 1947 Sing O Barren, revision of Do These Bones Live
  • 1950 Flea of Sodom, essays and parables
  • 1957 The Sorrows of Priapus
  • 1960 Can These Bones Live, second revision of Do These Bones Live
  • 1961 Truth Is More Sacred
  • 1964 Because I Was Flesh, autobiography
  • 1964 Alms for Oblivion, essays and reminiscences
  • 1965 Reasons of the Heart: Maxims
  • 1966 Cipango’s Hinder Door, poems
  • 1967 The Dahlberg Reader
  • 1967 Epitaphs of Our Times, letters
  • 1967 The Leafless American, miscellany
  • 1968 The Carnal Myth: A Search Into Classical Sensuality
  • 1971 The Confessions of Edward Dahlberg, autobiography and fiction
  • 1976 The Olive of Minerva: Or, The Comedy of a Cuckold
  • 1989 Samuel Beckett's Wake & Other Uncollected Prose

External links

References


 
 

 

Copyrights:

Columbia Encyclopedia. The Columbia Electronic Encyclopedia, Sixth Edition Copyright © 2003, Columbia University Press. Licensed from Columbia University Press. All rights reserved. www.cc.columbia.edu/cu/cup/ Read more
Works. The Chronology of American Literature, edited by Daniel S. Burt. Copyright © 2004 by Houghton Mifflin Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Company. All rights reserved.  Read more
Quotes By. Copyright © 2008 QuotationsBook.com. All rights reserved.  Read more
Wikipedia. This article is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License. It uses material from the Wikipedia article "Edward Dahlberg" Read more