John Dos Passos (1896–1970)
Author of Manhattan Transfer
About the Author
John Dos Passos, 1896 - 1970 John Passos was born January 14,1896 to John Randolph Dos Passos and Lucy Addison Sprigg Madison. He attended Harvard University from 1912-1916. He was in the ambulance service units in France and Italy and in 1918, enlisted in the U.S. Army Medical Corps. From 1926-29, show more he directed New Playwrights' Theatre in New York City. In 1929, Passos married Katharine Smith and in 1947, they were in an automobile accident that killed his wife and left him blind in one eye. He married Elizabeth Holdridge in 1949 and a year later, Lucy Hamlin Dos Passos was born. Passos' many novels include "One Man's Initiation" (1917), "Three Soldiers" (1921), which has met with wide acclaim, "Streets of Night" (1923), "Facing the Chair" (1927), which defends the immigrants Sacco and Vanzetti, "Orient Express" (1927), "The Ground We Stand On" (1949), and "Prospects of a Golden Age" (1959). He received the Gold Medal for fiction from the National Institute of Arts and Letters in 1957, the Feltrinelli Prize for Fiction in 1967 and was elected to the American Academy of Arts and Letters in 1947. On September 28, 1970, Passos died of heart failure in Baltimore, Maryland. (Bowker Author Biography) show less
Image credit: Mondadori Portfolio/Getty Images, from Library of America website
Series
Works by John Dos Passos
Mr. Wilson's War: From the Assassination of McKinley to the Defeat of the League of Nations (1811) 133 copies
UN LUGAR EN LA TIERRA 7 copies
Viajes de entreguerras: Una visión del mundo entre la Primera Guerra Mundial y la Guerra Civil española (ODISEAS)… (2006) 7 copies
Novelas 5 copies
42eme Parallele 4 copies
O Grande Capital 3 copies
Manhattan transfer II 3 copies
John Dos Passos' correspondence with Arthur K. McComb, or, "Learn to sing the Carmagnole" (1991) 3 copies
La grosse galette t. 2 2 copies
La grosse galette t. 1 2 copies
The Body of an American 2 copies
Airways, inc., 2 copies
U.S.A. The Big Money - Illustrated 2 copies
Devetnajststo devetnajst 1 copy
PRIMER ENCUENTRO 1 copy
CALLES DE LA NOCHE 1 copy
L'an Premier du Siecle 1 copy
U. S. A., The Big Money 1 copy
Collected Works of John Dos Passos: (One Man's Initiation--1917, A Pushcart At The Curb, Rosinante To The Road… (2016) 1 copy
U.S.A./42.Enlem 1 copy
Hombre Jóven a la Aventura 1 copy
Drei Soldaten 1 copy
Tin Lizzie [from "USA"] 1 copy
Meester Veelson [from "USA"] 1 copy
La primera catástrofe 1 copy
Manhattan Transfer 1 copy
U.S.A./1919 1 copy
Die schönen Zeiten 1 copy
2005 1 copy
Servizio speciale 1 copy
Veliki denar 1 copy
Le vie della liberta 1 copy
Novelas. Tomo II : Un Lugar en la Tierra . Podria Salir Bien. Tres Soldados. Primer Encuentro. Calles de Noche (1970) 1 copy
Manhattan Transfer vol. I 1 copy
Art And Isadora 1 copy
Ciężkie pieniądze 1 copy
Il mondo fuori casa: romanzo 1 copy
Argus Bookshop Business Reply Card (Postmarked Jul? 1950) Autograph From John Dos Passos to Argus 1 copy
Prospects of a golden age 1 copy
DOS PASSOS: U.S.A 1 copy
Manhatten Transfer. Dos Passos’ depiction of the city of New York and Ellen Thatcher’s & Jimmy Herfs’… (2008) 1 copy
Prospects of a Golden Age 1 copy
Associated Works
American Poetry: The Twentieth Century, Volume Two: E. E. Cummings to May Swenson (2000) — Contributor — 395 copies
The Lincoln Anthology: Great Writers on His Life and Legacy from 1860 to Now (2008) — Contributor — 150 copies
An American Album: One Hundred and Fifty Years of Harper's Magazine (2000) — Contributor — 129 copies
Oogst der tijden : keur uit de werken van schrijvers en dichters aller volken en eeuwen (1940) — Contributor — 10 copies
Tagged
Common Knowledge
- Legal name
- Dos Passos, John Roderigo
- Birthdate
- 1896-01-14
- Date of death
- 1970-09-28
- Burial location
- Yeocomico Churchyard Cemetery, Cople Parish, Virginia, USA
- Gender
- male
- Nationality
- USA
- Country (for map)
- USA
- Birthplace
- Chicago, Illinois, USA
- Place of death
- Baltimore, Maryland, USA
- Cause of death
- heart failure
- Places of residence
- Westmoreland, Virginia, USA
- Education
- Harvard University (BA|1916)
Choate School - Occupations
- novelist
poet
playwright
painter - Organizations
- American Volunteer Motor Ambulance Corps
United States Army Medical Corps - Awards and honors
- American Academy of Arts and Letters (1947)
Antonio Feltrinelli Prize (1967)
Members
Discussions
April-June Theme Read: War and Regions in Conflict in Reading Globally (September 6)
AMERICAN AUTHORS CHALLENGE--JUNE 2022--JOHN DOS PASSOS in 75 Books Challenge for 2022 (July 2022)
Reviews
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Awards
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Statistics
- Works
- 135
- Also by
- 25
- Members
- 10,110
- Popularity
- #2,349
- Rating
- 3.8
- Reviews
- 121
- ISBNs
- 454
- Languages
- 18
- Favorited
- 1
- About
- 1
- Touchstones
- 275
I had read the trilogy "USA" in 1972 and thought it was revolutionary writing and loved its locomotive narrative.
Dos Passos' diaries and letters are worth reading. He comes across as a retiring thoughtful man with a genius for inventive expression and someone keen for experience.
We follow his development from student to volunteer ambulance service in Europe and Army service in World War I. He was a frequent traveller always interested in how the working citizen was being influenced by the mass movements of the first half of the Twentieth Century.
Over a lifetime Dos Passos gave away his socialist beliefs to such an extent that he ended up a Goldwater advocate in 1964. This change was influenced by his ever growing distrust of communism and political "isms".
There is wonderful correspondence with Hemingway, Edmund Wilson, Malcolm Cowley, Fitzgerald and E.E. Cummings to mention the most well-known.
His life at Harvard, travels in Spain, the Near East and Russia, the USA in the Thirties, the Spanish Civil War (where his disquiet with communism was fully realized) and post World War II are all covered.
He was often in straitened circumstances (the correspondence often shows him requesting a loan of a couple of hundred dollars to tide him over). He suffered ill-heath for decades and tragedy struck when his first wife was killed in a car crash. To the end of his days he remained an affectionate man with a healthy capacity for disbelief in the prevailing discourse.
Each period of his life is provided with an introductory piece by the editor in the form of a biographical narrative.
Good reading.… (more)