American novelist, 20th century birth Introduction (Book Guide)

Source: Wikipedia. Pages: 43. Chapters: Walter Van Tilburg Clark, Lauran Paine, Sloan Wilson, Evan S. Connell, Karan Mahajan, Helen Z. Papanikolas, Edward Dahlberg, Nick McDonell, Harry Brown, Douglas Thayer, Frank G. Slaughter, John Hawkes, Earl Hamner, Jr., Peter De Vries, Oakley Hall, Lewis B. Patten, Elizabeth Hardwick, Lawrence Schoonover, Mary Lee Settle, Josephine Johnson, William Charles Anderson, Donn Pearce, Lawrence Sanders, Borden Deal, Giles A. Lutz, Tim Downs, Walter Wager, Barbara Faith, Frederick Manfred, Joe David Brown, Sol Yurick, Ross Lockridge, Jr., Louis Kronenberger, Jack Schaefer, Robert Cantwell, Ned Vizzini, Matthew Randazzo V, Irving Shulman, Irene Hunt, Lloyd Arthur Eshbach, Don Robertson, Isabelle Holland, Mark Schorer, Melissa Walker, José Antonio Villarreal, Thomas Berger, Hilary Masters, Alice Adams, Gina Berriault, Meridel Le Sueur, Arthur Herzog, J. F. Powers, Theodore Isaac Rubin, Donald Heiney, Ed Lacy, Pat Frank, Robert Lewis Taylor, Roderick MacLeish, Delano Ames, Calder Willingham, James Bassett, Ernest Tidyman, Jay Anson, Nathalia Crane, William Campbell Gault, Olive Ann Burns, Anne George, Frank O'Rourke, Clancy Sigal, Whit Masterson, Gladys Hasty Carroll, Stephen Minot, William X. Kienzle, William Diehl, Harry Whittington, Rosa Guy, Gwen Bristow, Thomas B. Dewey, Todhunter Ballard, Eugene Burdick, Helen MacInnes, Malcolm Bosse, Merriam Modell, Thomas Bell, Collin Wilcox, Vereen Bell, Frank Gruber, Thomas Flanagan, Tom Kromer, Jane Richardson, Leslie Jamison, Noah Gordon, William Robert Cox, John Alfred "Jack" Webb, Lawrence Treat, Hollister Noble, Daisy Newman, Jay Dratler, Jacqueline Briskin, Sybil Claiborne, Clair Huffaker, Sheila Gordon, Aimee Carter, E. M. Nathanson, Leslie Edgley, Louis Trimble, Dolores Hitchens, Ira Wallach, Gordon Webber, William J. Coughlin, Alan Hathway, Helen Wells, Ignatia Broker. Excerpt: Walter Van Tilburg Clark (August 3, 1909 - November 10, 1971) was an American novelist, short story writer, and educator. He ranks as one of Nevada's most distinguished literary figures of the 20th century and is known primarily for his novels, his one volume of stories, as well as his uncollected short stories. As a writer, he taught himself to use the familiar materials of the western saga to explore the human psyche and to raise deep philosophical issues. Born in East Orland, Maine, Clark grew up and went to college in Reno, where his father was president of the University of Nevada. During 1933 Clark married Barbara Frances Morse and moved to Cazenovia, New York, where he taught high school English and began his fiction-writing career. Clark's first published novel, The Ox-Bow Incident (1940), was successful and is often considered to be the first modern Western, without the genre usual clichés and formulaic plots. It is a tale about a posse mistaking three innocent travelers for cattle rustlers. When the travelers are killed, the posse-turned-lynch mob finds that they were wrong. The book examines law and order as well as culpability. It was well-received and gave Clark literary acclaim that was unusual for a writer of Westerns. During 1943 it was adapted into a movie featuring Henry Fonda. Clark's short story, "The Portable Phonograph", is also well known. He published two more novels, The City of Trembling Leaves and The Track of the Cat, and a collection of his short stories over the next decade, which were also well-received. His short stories (such as "Hoo...