Keith Botsford

File:SaulBellowAndKeithBotsford.jpg

Saul Bellow (left) with Keith Botsford ca 1992

Keith Botsford (born March 29, 1928, in Brussels, Belgium) is an American/European writer, Professor Emeritus at Boston University and current editor of News from the Republic of Letters.

Career

Botsford’s work as a novelist is divided into two periods: the first four novels – The Master Race [1955], The Eighth-best-dressed-Man in the World [1957], Benvenuto [1961] and The March-Man [1964] – were either semi-autobiographical or political in nature; his later books (after he returned to fiction in 1989) include three major autobiographical works: O Brother! [2000], The Mothers [2002], and Death and the Maiden [2007] form a coherent trilogy about his brother, his early wives (and mothers) and, in the last, a reprise of The March-Man, his father. During this second period he also published a series of stories and novellas, described as ‘imaginary biographies’, collected in Out of Nowhere [2000]. At the same time he also wrote five non-fiction books on sporting figures and four crime and espionage novels under the pseudonym I.I. Magdalen.

Published works

Book introduction

Ceremony in Lone Tree, by Wright Morris. Publisher: Bison Books, September 1, 2001, 304 pages. Introduction by Keith Botsford

Web

• Keith Botsford's Blog
• Keith Botsford's Official Site

Newspaper articles

The Sunday Times of London, The Independent, La Stampa

External links

• The Keith Botsford Papers at the Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library, Yale University