George Jean Nathan

George Jean Nathan (February 14, 1882 – April 8, 1958) was an American drama critic and magazine editor. He worked closely as an editor with H. L. Mencken bringing the literary magazine The Smart Set to prominence and while co-founding and editing The American Mercury and The American Spectator.

Early life and education Nathan was born in Fort Wayne, Indiana, on February 14, 1882, the son of Ella (Nirdlinger) and Charles Naret Nathan. He was graduated from Cornell University in 1904. There, he was a member of the Quill and Dagger society and an editor of The Cornell Daily Sun.

Career

Nathan wrote the plays The Artist (1912) and Heliogabalus (1920) with H. L. Mencken; he was sole author of The Eternal Mystery (1913) and The Avon Flows (1937). The Eternal Mystery premiered in 1913 at the Princess Theatre in Manhattan. Owen Hatteras referred to the play as a failure when he quipped that Nathan had "...forbidden the production of the play henceforth in any American city save Chicago, in which city anyone who chooses may perform it without payment of royalties." The Avon Flows is a conflation of three Shakespeare plays (Romeo and Juliet, The Taming of the Shrew, and Othello).

Relationships and marriage Nathan had a reputation as a "ladies' man" and the character of Addison De Witt, the waspish theater critic who squires a starlet (played by a then-unknown Marilyn Monroe) in the 1950 film All About Eve was based on Nathan.

Beginning in the late 1920s, Nathan had a romantic relationship with actress Lillian Gish that lasted almost a decade. Gish repeatedly refused his proposals of marriage.

At age 73 in 1955, Nathan married Julie Haydon (1910–1994). She was a stage and film actress who debuted on Broadway in 1935.

Death Nathan died in Manhattan in 1958, aged 76. He and his wife are buried together in the Cemetery of the Gate of Heaven in Hawthorne, New York.

Legacy An honor in dramatic criticism, the George Jean Nathan Award, is named after him. Nathan was inducted into the American Theater Hall of Fame.

Papers A collection of Nathan-Haydon papers was donated by Haydon to the La Crosse Public Library archives in La Crosse, Wisconsin, her residence at the time of her death. Separate from that collection of papers, Nathan bequeathed a collection of his letters and papers to Cornell University. Among the papers at Cornell are several letters he received from Eugene O'Neill.

Non-fiction works Europe After 8:15 with H. L. Mencken and W. H. Wright (1914) The Theatre Book of the Year, 1943-44

Secondary sources Isaac Goldberg: George Jean Nathan: A Critical Study (Girard, Kansas, Haldeman-Julius Company [c.1925]) Seymour Rudin: George Jean Nathan: A Study of His Criticism ([Ithaca, N.Y.] 1953) Thomas F. Connolly: George Jean Nathan and the Making of Modern American Drama Criticism (Madison: Faileigh Dickinson University Press, c.2000)