Booth Tarkington
American novelist (1869–1946)
Newton Booth Tarkington (July 29, 1869 – May 19, 1946) was an American novelist and dramatist best known for his novels The Magnificent Ambersons (1918) and Alice Adams (1921). He is one of only four novelists to win the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction more than once, along with William Faulkner, John Updike, and Colson Whitehead. In the 1910s and 1920s he was considered the greatest living author in the United States. Several of his stories were adapted to film.
During the first quarter of the 20th century, Tarkington, along with Meredith Nicholson, George Ade, Gene Stratton-Porter and James Whitcomb Riley helped create a Golden Age of literature in Indiana.
Tarkington served one term in the Indiana House of Representatives, was critical of the advent of automobiles, and set many of his stories in the Midwest. He eventually moved to Kennebunkport, Maine, where he continued to work even as he suffered a loss of vision.
He is often cited as an example of an author who enjoyed great success when alive, but whose reputation and influence did not survive his death.
Early life and education
Tarkington was born in Indianapolis, Indiana, on July 29, 1869, the son of John S. Tarkington, a judge, and Elizabeth Booth Tarkington. He came from a patrician Midwestern family that had lost much of its wealth after the Panic of 1873.
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