Robert Coates (critic)

Robert M. Coates (April 6, 1897– February 8, 1973) was an American novelist, essayist, art critic and poet, best known for having written "The Eater of Darkness". The Eater of Darkness is widely considered the first Dada novel written in English. It was hailed by Gertrude Stein as a literary masterpiece. Coates was also an art critic for the New Yorker magazine. He coined the term "abstract expressionism" in the March issue of the New Yorker, in 1936.

Robert M Coates
Born	April 6, 1897
Died	February 8, 1973
Nationality	American
Field	Writer
Works	The Eater of Darkness, Wisteria Cottage, The Bitter Season, The Farther Shore, Yesterday's Burdens
Influenced	William Burroughs, JG Ballard

History

Robert M. Coates was born in New Haven, Connecticut in 1897; the son of an inventor and tool designer. After moving around the US during most of his youth, he fought in WW1, after which he returned to Connecticut to attend Yale University, graduating with the class of 1919.

By the early 1920's Coates was living in Paris, where he became immersed in the art and literary scenes of the time. His colleagues included Robert McAlmon, Kenneth Burke, Andre Breton, Malcolm Cowley, Ernest Hemingway, Gertrude Stein, James Thurber, Tristan Tzara, Nathanael West and E. B. White.

When he published The Eater of Darkness, in 1926, he became the toast of the Parisian literary scene. He was adored by the Surrealists, who delighted in his complete disregard for conventional syntax and punctuation, beautiful freestyle prose, and unrestrained imagination. The Eater of Darkness was hailed by Gertrude Stein as a literary masterpiece, as well as the first Dada novel written in English. Anthony Boucher praised Coates as "one of the most persuasive recorders of the unaccountable and disturbing moment," singling out his fantasy stories for their "haunting tone of uncertainty and dislocation."

Coates became a regular visitor at 27, rue de Fleurus, Gertude Stein's home and parlor, along with many other notable writers, including Rene Crevel, Glenway Wescott, Bravig Imbs, Max Ewing and Paul Bowles.

At the end of 1929, Coates returned to New York and began working for The New Yorker, where he remained for thirty years, publishing numerous short stories, the best known of which is The Fury (1937). He also published many novels during this period, including Wisteria Cottage, Yesterdays Burdens, The Bitter Season, and The Farther Shore.

Coates died in New York City in 1973.

Partial bibliography

Novels

• The Eater of Darkness (Paris 1926; Macaulay, New York, 1929; republished by Putnam, 1959)
• Yesterday's Burdens (1933; repr. 1975)
• The Bitter Season (1946)
• Wisteria Cottage (1948)
• The Farther Shore (1955)

Short story collections

• All the Year Round (1943)
• The Hour After Westerly (1957)
• The Man Just Ahead of You (1965)

Short stories

• Coates, Robert (29 November 1947). "The law". The New Yorker 23 (41): 41–43. 

Non-fiction

• The Outlaw Years: The History of the Land Pirates of the Natchez Trace (1930)
• The View from Here (1960). Memoir
• Beyond the Alps (1961)
• South of Rome (1965)

Articles

• Coates, Robert (15 January 1949). "The Art Galleries: Blume, Delaunay, Glackens". The New Yorker 24 (47): 48–49.  Reviews Peter Blume at the Durlacher Gallery, Robert Delaunay at the Sidney Janis Gallery, and William Glackens at the Kraushaar Galleries.
• Coates, Robert (28 January 1950). "The Art Galleries: Rembrandt and Juan Gris". The New Yorker 25 (49): 60, 62.  Reviews Rembrandt at the Wildenstein Gallery; Gris at the Buchholz Gallery.

Further reading

• Pierce, Constance. "Gertrude Stein and her Thoroughly Modern Protege." Modern Fiction Studies 42.3 (Autumn 1996): 607-25.
• ---. "Language • Silence • Laughter: The Silent Film and the 'Eccentric' Modernist Writer." SubStance 16.1 (1987): 59-75.
• Roza, Mathilde. "Following Strangers: The Life and Literary Works of Robert M. Coates." Columbia, SC: University of South Carolina Press, 2011.