Carl Van Doren: A Man of Ideas

In this admiring and enthusiastic biography, historian Foster (The Age of Sail in the Age of Aquarius) examines the life and work of critic Carl Van Doren (1885–1950). She carefully traces Van Doren’s Illinois upbringing and his early desire to move to New York City, where he would go on to study, and later teach, at Columbia University. Drawing deeply on Van Doren’s correspondence with writers including Mary Hunter Austin, Theodore Dreiser, and Sinclair Lewis, Foster reveals his intense engagement with the literary culture of early and mid-20th-century America. These contributions included a steady stream of essays and book reviews for periodicals such as Century, the Nation, and the Saturday Review of Literature; presiding over selections for one of the first monthly book clubs, the Literary Guild of America; and writing the Pulitzer-winning biography Benjamin Franklin. Foster finds Van Doren “at his most brilliant” as a critic in his introductory essay for Carl Van Doren: The Viking Portable Library, which contained the ringing declaration that “American literature is the only important literature in the world that is younger than the art of printing.” Foster’s in-depth study of Van Doren as an exemplar of an “era when the Man of Ideas was itself a calling” should stand for many years to come. (BookLife)