Walter Van Tilburg Clark

Walter Van Tilburg Clark (August 3, 1909 — November 10, 1971) was a writer of short stories, poetry and novels, best known for his first novel, The Ox-Bow Incident.

Biography

Born in East Orland, Maine, Clark grew up and went to college in Reno, where his father was president of the University of Nevada. In 1933 Clark married and moved to Cazenovia, New York, where he taught high school English and began his fiction-writing career. His first book, The Ox-Bow Incident, published in 1940, is a tale about two men mistaking three innocent travelers of stealing cattle. When the travelers are killed, the men (Art and Gil), find that they were wrong. The book shows the need for law and order and also was well-received and gave Clark a level of literary acclaim that was unusual for a writer of Westerns. In 1943 it was adapted into a movie starring Henry Fonda. Clark published two more novels, The City of Trembling Leaves and The Track of the Cat, and a collection of his short stories over the next decade, which were also well-received. Although he continued to write prolifically after 1950, Clark published very little. He took several academic positions, including returning to Reno to serve as the writer-in-residence at the university from 1962 until his death in Reno, Nov. in 1971

Books by Clark

Novels

• The Ox-Bow Incident (1940)
• The City of Trembling Leaves (1945)
• The Track of the Cat (1949)

Short Story Collections

• The Watchful Gods (1950)
• The Portable Phonograph

External links

• [1] entry on Clark in the Nevada Writers Hall of Fame.