"He was precocious, alert, intelligent, brash, challenging, irreverent, literary, self-conscious, insecure, often ostentatiously crude, sometimes insufferable," Wallace Stegner says of Bernard DeVoto, who, in the words of a childhood acquaintance, was also "the ugliest, most disagreeable boy you ever saw." Between the disagreeable boy and the literary lion, a life unfolds, "He was precocious, alert, intelligent, brash, challenging, irreverent, literary, self-conscious, insecure, often ostentatiously crude, sometimes insufferable," Wallace Stegner says of Bernard DeVoto, who, in the words of a childhood acquaintance, was also "the ugliest, most disagreeable boy you ever saw." Between the disagreeable boy and the literary lion, a life unfolds, full of comedy and drama, as told in this definitive biography, which brings together two exemplary American men of letters. Born within a dozen years of one another in small towns in Utah, both men were, as Stegner writes, "novelists by intention, teachers by necessity, and historians by the sheer compulsion of the region that shaped us." From this unique vantage point, Stegner follows DeVoto's path from his beloved but not particularly congenial Utah to the even less congenial Harvard where, galvanized by the disregard of the aesthetes around him, he commenced a career that, over three and a half decades, would embrace nearly every sort of literary enterprise: from modestly successful novels to prize-winning Western histories, from the editorship of the Saturday Review to a famously combative, long-running monthly column in Harper's, "The Easy Chair." A nuanced portrait of a stormy literary life, Stegner's biography of DeVoto is also a window on the tumultuous world of American letters in the twentieth century.
The Uneasy Chair: A Biography of Bernard Devoto
"He was precocious, alert, intelligent, brash, challenging, irreverent, literary, self-conscious, insecure, often ostentatiously crude, sometimes insufferable," Wallace Stegner says of Bernard DeVoto, who, in the words of a childhood acquaintance, was also "the ugliest, most disagreeable boy you ever saw." Between the disagreeable boy and the literary lion, a life unfolds, "He was precocious, alert, intelligent, brash, challenging, irreverent, literary, self-conscious, insecure, often ostentatiously crude, sometimes insufferable," Wallace Stegner says of Bernard DeVoto, who, in the words of a childhood acquaintance, was also "the ugliest, most disagreeable boy you ever saw." Between the disagreeable boy and the literary lion, a life unfolds, full of comedy and drama, as told in this definitive biography, which brings together two exemplary American men of letters. Born within a dozen years of one another in small towns in Utah, both men were, as Stegner writes, "novelists by intention, teachers by necessity, and historians by the sheer compulsion of the region that shaped us." From this unique vantage point, Stegner follows DeVoto's path from his beloved but not particularly congenial Utah to the even less congenial Harvard where, galvanized by the disregard of the aesthetes around him, he commenced a career that, over three and a half decades, would embrace nearly every sort of literary enterprise: from modestly successful novels to prize-winning Western histories, from the editorship of the Saturday Review to a famously combative, long-running monthly column in Harper's, "The Easy Chair." A nuanced portrait of a stormy literary life, Stegner's biography of DeVoto is also a window on the tumultuous world of American letters in the twentieth century.
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Tommy Powell –
I had no idea who Bernard Devoto was but soon learned. Stegner's bio caught me from the first page and I finished this book within 3 weeks. Then I went looking for "Across the Wide Missouri" -Devoto's Pulitzer Prize winner (1948) which is one of my top 10 all time favorites. I had no idea who Bernard Devoto was but soon learned. Stegner's bio caught me from the first page and I finished this book within 3 weeks. Then I went looking for "Across the Wide Missouri" -Devoto's Pulitzer Prize winner (1948) which is one of my top 10 all time favorites.
Phoebe –
Knowing very little about DeVoto, other than his wife's connection with Julia Child, I thought to pick this biography up especially since it was written by the great Stegner. Right away one realizes this is not your typical biography, so lively and literary is the style. DeVoto's tumultuous mentality and his unlikely roots, his fight to leave small town Utah and eventual literary success make for good storytelling. Adult, and for specialized interest. Knowing very little about DeVoto, other than his wife's connection with Julia Child, I thought to pick this biography up especially since it was written by the great Stegner. Right away one realizes this is not your typical biography, so lively and literary is the style. DeVoto's tumultuous mentality and his unlikely roots, his fight to leave small town Utah and eventual literary success make for good storytelling. Adult, and for specialized interest.
Glen –
A comprehensive biography of an almost forgotten writer and editor.
Anson Cassel Mills –
The Uneasy Chair is a fine, friendly, but not uncritical, biography of one Pulitzer-Prize-winning author, Bernard DeVoto (1897-1955), by another, his colleague and fellow westerner Wallace Stegner (1909-1993). Stegner masterfully handles DeVoto’s philosophy of literature and his unrequited professional yearnings. In no time the reader wonders why DeVoto failed to realize that his gift lay in nonfiction and not in novel writing. Stegner merely sketches DeVoto’s family life, but DeVoto’s personali The Uneasy Chair is a fine, friendly, but not uncritical, biography of one Pulitzer-Prize-winning author, Bernard DeVoto (1897-1955), by another, his colleague and fellow westerner Wallace Stegner (1909-1993). Stegner masterfully handles DeVoto’s philosophy of literature and his unrequited professional yearnings. In no time the reader wonders why DeVoto failed to realize that his gift lay in nonfiction and not in novel writing. Stegner merely sketches DeVoto’s family life, but DeVoto’s personality is always on display, especially his compulsiveness and insecurity, the latter of which was so serious that it sporadically verged on panic. This is a worthy biography written with a novelist’s flair.
Marilynn Smith –
DeVoto was a fascinating hero of America. I recommend you read this to expand your horizons.
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