Bernard DeVoto

Bernard Augustine DeVoto (January 11, 1897 - November 13, 1955) was an American historian and author who specialized in the history of the American West. He was born in Ogden, Utah. He attended the University of Utah for a few years, but interrupted his education to serve in World War I. After the war, he attended Harvard University.

Related Topics:
January 11 - 1897 - November 13 - 1955 - American - Historian - Author - American West - Ogden, Utah - University of Utah - World War I - Harvard University

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He began his career as an English instructor at Northwestern University and began to write articles and novels, which often provoked controversy for their liberal viewpoint. Sometimes he used the pseudonyms John August and Cady Hewes. After several years, DeVoto resigned from Northwestern and moved to Massachusetts with his wife. He began to devote himself to serious writing along with part-time instructing at Harvard. He wrote frequent articles for periodicals, with a regular column, "The Easy Chair," in Harper's Magazine from 1935 until his death.

Related Topics:
English - Northwestern University - Liberal - Massachusetts - Harper's Magazine

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DeVoto became an authority on Mark Twain and served as a curator and editor for Mark Twain's papers. For a few years in the late 1930s he lived in New York City, where he was editor of the Saturday Review of Literature, and then returned to Massachusetts.

Related Topics:
Mark Twain - New York City - Saturday Review of Literature

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In DeVoto's later years, he gained fame for his popular histories of the West, starting with Across the Wide Missouri, and for his pugnacious and controversial defenses of land and water conservation and of civil liberties.

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His son, Mark DeVoto, is a prominent music theorist and professor at Tufts University.

Related Topics:
Music theorist - Professor - Tufts University

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