Teacher Roster

Author Biographies

Literary Essays

The Life of Thomas Wolfe 

(1900-1938)

            Thomas Wolfe was an American author who attained the status of literary great despite dying at an early age. His first novel, LOOK HOMEWARD ANGEL (1929), is the work he is best known for, but his considerable literary achievements are not focused singularly in this novel alone. Despite living a short life, Wolfe has an astonishingly large body of work attributed to his name. His literary contributions can still be seen in the writing of contemporary authors to this very day.

            Thomas Clayton Wolfe was born in Asheville, North Carolina, in 1900. His parents were William Olivier Wolfe, a Pennsylvanian stonecutter, and Julia Elizabeth Westall, a native girl. While Julia went on to become a real estate speculator, a usual position for a woman to have in that day and age, William took the tedious job of making tombstones. Despite this humdrum occupation, Wolfe’s father had a great enthusiasm for life, and frequently engaged in drinking binges that left him disoriented and in the mood to recite Shakespearean sonnets to his wife and children in a booming voice that echoed throughout the entire foundation of their home, and reverberated in the wooden planks that held the house together. For Wolfe, the house always held the presence of his parents, who he accredited with making his youth enjoyable.

            Wolfe grew up in a big family in which his parents could rarely afford to make distinctions between their children, but they nevertheless loved them all the same. At the age of four, his brother Grover died, and the incident often found itself repeated in some of Wolfe’s later works. At the age of eleven, Thomas began attending public school. The school was run by a Mr. and Mrs. J.M. Roberts. Roberts’ wife, Margaret, encouraged the young Wolfe to read frequently, and it was from her that he derived his early love of literature. Thomas attended school with all of his brothers and sisters, but the sibling he enjoyed the company of the most was his brother Benjamin. The two got along well, but they rarely showed each other any real affection, with Ben hiding his love for his brother most of the time behind a cynical front. Despite this, the two were the best of friends as children.

            The personal attention that was afforded Thomas by Mrs. Roberts founded his intellectual interest in all things literary, and Wolfe decided upon enrolling in the University of North Carolina, where he studied being a playwright under Professor Frederick H. Koch.  After only three years of studying under Professor Koch, Wolfe completed a one-act play entitled The Return of Buck Gavin. The play was performed that same year by the Carolina Playmakers.  That same year, another play by Wolfe, The Third Night, was performed by the Playmakers. The following year, Wolf graduated from the university, and ventured to Harvard University to continue his studies. Here at the acclaimed Graduate School for Arts and Sciences, Wolfe studied under George Pierce Baker.  Professor Baker ran a well-known class for studying the theater known as Workshop 47.  With the help of Baker, Wolfe was able to complete a ten-scene play entitled Welcome to Our City. That same year in June, William Olivier Wolfe died.

Following the death of his father, Wolfe continued on with his studies until 1923. Having had no luck getting any of his recent plays performed, the young author gave up and left Harvard, and moved to New York City. He began teaching at the Washington Square College of New York University as an English professor. Until 1930, Wolfe instructed at the school, with only his frequent trips to Europe interrupting his teaching.  The same year as he began teaching in New York, Wolfe decided upon taking a trip to Europe. He traveled throughout West Europe, and in 1925 returned to America. On his return trip, Wolfe met Alice Borstein, a set and costume designer in the New York Theater Guild. She was married to a wealthy stockbroker and 19 years Wolfe’s senior, but the two hit it off, and were soon having a passionate love affair.

            The following year, Wolfe began writing LOOK HOMEWARD, ANGEL (1928) during his fourth European vacation. With the help of his lover both financially and emotionally, Wolfe was able to complete the novel, and sent it to Scribner’s publishing house, where it was received by editor, Maxwell Perkins. Perkins was also the editor for Ernest Hemingway, who had been recommended by another client held by Perkins, F. Scott Fitzgerald.  The novel was accepted by the Scribner’s editor, and in October of 1929, the work was published. The novel is the story of Eugene Gant, a young man modeled after Wolfe’s father who grows restless in a small North Carolina town. Despite receiving excellent reviews, the novel only sold modestly.

            In 1930, Wolfe ended his affair with Alice Borstein, quit his teaching job, rented an apartment in Brooklyn, and devoted himself to writing full-time.  With the encouragement of his editor at Scribner’s, Wolfe completed his second novel, OF TIME AND THE RIVER (1934). The novel was the sequel to LOOK HOMEWARD, ANGEL, and depicts Eugene Gant leaving the small town he loathes, and enrolling in Harvard University, and later traveling to New York. The autobiographical piece was once again well-received by critics, although the majority of the reviews made a point of noting Wolfe’s tendency to lose himself in his own prose for pages at a time, and not the public. The novel had been difficult to write for Wolfe, but he had, nevertheless, completed the work at the urgings of Perkins to finish the novel before everything else. Not happy with the editing job of the novel, and feeling too dependent on Perkins, Wolfe broke off from Scribner’s and joined Harpers publishing house.

            The next year, Wolfe left all of his manuscripts with his new editor, packed up, and left for a literary tour across America. However, before he could complete the tour, Wolfe became ill with pneumonia. He entered the John Hopkins University Hospital in 1938, and doctors discovered that Wolfe was suffering from tuberculosis. They attempted to operate on Wolfe but to no avail. On September 15, 1938, Thomas Wolfe died. After his death, Wolfe’s editor published two more novels by Wolfe posthumously. Though he died young, Wolfe’s memory as an artist endures to this day. His vast vocabulary, lyrical prose, and unique rhetoric ensure his staying power as an author, and although the amount of work he amassed in his literary career was in many ways small, it is nevertheless an important contribution to the literary world. Wolfe’s style and understanding of the craft of writing are still inherent in many of today’s modern authors, including John Updike and Michael Chabon.

The Works of Thomas Wolfe

Written by Cyanne Topaum

           Back to Author Biographies