Robert Nathan

Robert Gruntal Nathan (January 2, 1894 – May 25, 1985) was an American novelist and poet.

Biography Nathan was born into a prominent New York Sephardic Jewish family. He was educated privately in Switzerland and attended Phillips Exeter Academy, then entered Harvard University in 1912. It was there that his short fiction and poetry was first published, in the prestigious literary magazine The Harvard Monthly, where he also became an editor. However, he never graduated, choosing instead to drop out and take a job at an advertising firm to support his family (he married while a junior at Harvard). It was while working in 1919 that he wrote his first novel—the semi-autobiographical work Peter Kindred—which was a critical failure. But his luck soon changed during the 1920s, when he wrote seven more novels, including The Bishop's Wife, which was later made into a successful film under the same title starring Cary Grant, David Niven, and Loretta Young in 1947.

During the 1930s, his success continued with more works, including fictional pieces and poetry. His 1933 novel One More Spring was filmed in 1935. In 1940, he wrote his most successful book, Portrait of Jennie, about a Depression-era artist and the woman he is painting, who is slipping through time. Portrait of Jennie is considered a modern masterpiece of fantasy fiction and was made into a film, starring Jennifer Jones and Joseph Cotten.

In 1942 Nathan wrote a poem "Dunkirk: A Ballad", then became a screenwriter for MGM, where he added additional poetry to update Alice Duer Miller's poem for the film The White Cliffs of Dover (1944). He then wrote the screenplay of The Clock (1945), in which he had a cameo role. His screenplay for 3 Godfathers (1948) was rejected, but he made contributions to the screenplay of Pagan Love Song (1950).

In January 1956 the author wrote, as well as narrated, an episode of the CBS Radio Workshop, called "A Pride of Carrots, or Venus Well-Served".

Nathan's seventh wife was the British actress Anna Lee, to whom he was married from 1970 until his death. He came from a talented family—the activist Maud Nathan and author Annie Nathan Meyer were his aunts, and the poet Emma Lazarus and Supreme Court Justice Benjamin Cardozo his cousins.

Works

Novels

Peter Kindred, 1919 Autumn, 1921 The Puppet Master, 1923 Jonah, 1925 The Fiddler in Barly, 1926 The Woodcutter's House, 1927 The Bishop's Wife, 1928 (filmed in 1947) There Is Another Heaven, 1929 The Orchid, 1931 One More Spring, 1933 (filmed in 1935) Road of Ages, 1935 The Enchanted Voyage, 1936 (filmed in 1946) Winter in April, 1938 Portrait of Jennie, 1940 (filmed in 1948) They Went On Together, 1941 The Sea-Gull Cry, 1942 But Gently Day, 1943 Mr. Whittle and the Morning Star, 1947 Long After Summer, 1948 (televised on The Alcoa Hour in 1956) The River Journey, 1949 The Married Look, 1950 The Innocent Eve, 1951 The Train in the Meadow, 1953 Sir Henry, 1955 The Rancho of the Little Loves, 1956 So Love Returns, 1958 The Color of the Evening, 1960 The Weans, 1960, The Wilderness-Stone, 1961 A Star in the Wind, 1962 The Devil with Love, 1963 The Fair, 1964 The Mallott Diaries, 1965 Stonecliff, 1967 Mia, 1970 The Elixir, 1971 The Summer Meadows, 1973 Heaven and Hell and the Megas Factor, 1975

Novel collections The Barly Fields, 1938 (collection containing The Fiddler in Barly, The Woodcutter's House, The Bishop's Wife, The Orchid, and There Is Another Heaven). Introduction by Stephen Vincent Benét. The Bishop's Wife and Two Other Novels, 1946 Armed Services Edition, published by the Council on Books in Wartime (shortened version of The Barly Fields, containing The Bishop's Wife, The Orchid, There Is Another Heaven, and Benét's introduction)

Plays Jezebel’s Husband & The Sleeping Beauty, 1953 (collection of two plays) Juliet in Mantua, 1966

Children's books Journey of Tapiola, 1938 Tapiola's Brave Regiment, 1941 The Adventures of Tapiola, 1950 (collection containing Journey of Tapiola and Tapiola's Brave Regiment) The Snowflake and the Starfish, 1959 Tappy, 1968

Screenplays The White Cliffs of Dover, 1944 (additional poetry) The Clock, 1945 Pagan Love Song, 1950

Nonfiction The Concert, 1940 Journal for Josephine, 1943

Poetry

Youth Grows Old, 1922 A Cedar Box, 1929 Selected Poems, 1935 A Winter Tide: Sonnets and Poems, 1940 Dunkirk: A Ballad, 1942 Morning in Iowa, 1944 The Darkening Meadows, 1945 The Green Leaf, 1950 The Married Man, 1962 Evening Song: Selected Poems 1950–1973, 1973

Radio programs CBS Radio Workshop, "A Pride of Carrots or Venus Well-Served," 1956 CBS Radio Workshop, "Report on the We'Uns," 1956

Television programs The Mark Twain Television Theatre, 1953.

Miscellaneous Two Robert Nathan Pieces, 1950 (book containing an interview with Mr. Nathan by Harvey Breit and the poem "Advice to My Son") "Robert Nathan Reading His Poems with Comment at His Home in Los Angeles, Calif., in April 1962", 1962 (tape reel sound recording)