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L. E. Modesitt Jr.

American writer

Correspondence, annotated notebooks and portrait silhouettes prepared for research
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Record originEnglish Wikipedia
Text licenseCC BY-SA 4.0
Source revisionAug 28, 2026
Entity authorityQ1797771 ↗
Source-derived summary

Leland Exton Modesitt Jr. (; born 1943) is an American science fiction and fantasy author who has written over 80 novels. He is best known for the fantasy series The Saga of Recluce. By 2015, the 18 novels in the Recluce series had sold nearly three million copies. By 2025, there were 25 Recluce novels.

In addition to his novels, Modesitt has published technical studies and articles, columns, poetry, and a number of science fiction stories. His first short story, "The Great American Economy", was published in 1973 in Analog Science Fiction and Science Fact. In 2008, he published his first collection of short stories, Viewpoints Critical: Selected Stories (Tor Books, 2008).

Modesitt was the Writer Guest of Honor at Balticon 58, held from May 24 to 27, 2024.

Early life

Modesitt was born in Denver, Colorado.

Editorial summary

Begin with the source’s own compact description: “L. E. Modesitt Jr.” is american writer. The dossier treats that line as a proposition to test through Modesitt, American and writer, not as a finished interpretation.

Editorial reviewA productive starting point for separating a subject’s documented career from later reputation and commemoration. The current lead gives the account dated anchors—1943, 2015, 2025, 1973—that can be checked directly. The linked authority record independently contributes the date 1943-10-19. For this dossier, Modesitt, American and writer is the immediate research focus.
Editorial analysis

Why this record matters

The phrase “american writer” supplies a clear boundary for inquiry. It also exposes the unanswered questions: who defined that boundary, when it became stable and which sources sit outside it.

Evidence profile

Chronology provides the most reliable spine for this subject; interpretation should follow only after identities and dates are secure. The source revision retrieved here is dated Aug 28, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q1797771. VIAF identifies the subject as 79452695. The Library of Congress control number is n88636272. 4 of 4 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1943, 2015, 2025 and 1973.

Critical limits

Later biographies can compress uncertainty and repeat inherited reputations, so apparently settled claims may still require comparison. The source lead contains qualifying language; that uncertainty should survive quotation, summary and reuse. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.

How to read it

Read biographical claims against dates, named institutions and the cited references. Distinguish a subject’s later reputation from evidence produced during their lifetime.

Best used for
  • Establishing names and roles
  • Building a first chronology
  • Locating cited institutions
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Personal papers, civil or court records, institutional files and the scholarship cited by the source.

Three-step research path

  1. Establish the record: confirm the title “L. E. Modesitt Jr.”, its source revision and the description used here.
  2. Expand the search: follow L. E. Modesitt Jr. primary sources, L. E. Modesitt Jr. archive and Modesitt research across catalogues and specialist indexes.
  3. Test the account: compare the strongest cited source with the responsible institution’s current record and note any disagreement.

Questions for further research

  1. Which source most directly establishes the central claim about “L. E. Modesitt Jr.”?
  2. Which primary records establish identity, chronology and institutional ties?
  3. How has the subject’s reputation changed across later accounts?
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Source & attribution

This entry incorporates text from “L. E. Modesitt Jr.” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.