Paul West (writer) facts for kids

Quick facts for kids Paul West
Paul West in Florida, 2010
Born	Paul Noden West (1930-02-23)23 February 1930 Eckington, Derbyshire, England
Died	18 October 2015(2015-10-18) (aged 85) Ithaca, New York, U.S.
Occupation	Author, professor
Genre	Novels, poetry, memoirs, essays
Spouses	Paula Radcliffe (1960) Diane Ackerman

Paul Noden West (23 February 1930 – 18 October 2015) was a British-born American novelist, poet, and essayist. He was born in Eckington, Derbyshire in England to Alfred and Mildred (Noden) West. Before his death, he resided in Ithaca, New York, with his wife Diane Ackerman, a writer, poet, and naturalist. West is the author of more than 50 books.

Early life

West grew up in Eckington, a rural mining town in Derbyshire, England. His father, partly blinded in World War I, was often unemployed. His mother, a talented pianist, gave private lessons to help support the family. She encouraged West in his love of words and his literary ambitions. In a 1989 interview by author and literary critic David W. Madden, West said he was also encouraged by three teachers, "amazing women who taught English, French, and Latin and Greek" at an otherwise "mediocre grammar school". They were, he said, "...marvelous to me. They encouraged me because they felt I had some gift for languages and should pursue that, and they groomed me."

After graduating with honors in English from the University of Birmingham, West studied at Lincoln College, Oxford, and then as a Smith-Mundt scholar at Columbia University in the United States from 1952 to 1953, from which he graduated with a master's degree. His early life also included a stint in the Royal Air Force from 1954 to 1957, during which he achieved the rank of flight lieutenant. From 1957 he taught English literature at Memorial University of Newfoundland until, in 1962, he began teaching at Pennsylvania State University. It was there in the early 1970s that he met Diane Ackerman, who became his wife.

Awards

Among other honors, West's literary awards have included the American Academy of Arts and Letters award for literature (1985), the Lannan Prize for fiction (1993), and the Grand-Prix Halpèrine-Kaminsky Prize (1993) for best foreign book. West was named a "literary lion" by the New York Public Library and a Chevalier of the Order of Arts and Letters (Ordre des Arts et Lettres) by the French government.

Personal life

West retired from teaching in 1995. In 2003, he had a stroke, his second, which his wife, Diane Ackerman, has written about in her book One Hundred Names for Love: A Stroke, a Marriage and the Language of Healing. He died on 18 October 2015 at the age of 85 in Ithaca, New York, from pneumonia. He is survived by his sister, Sheila Forster, and perhaps by a daughter, Amanda, about whom he wrote but with whom he later lost touch.

Works

Long fiction

• A Quality of Mercy, 1961
• Tenement of Clay, 1965
• Alley Jaggers, 1966
• I'm Expecting to Live Quite Soon, 1970
• Caliban's Filibuster, 1971
• Bela Lugosi's White Christmas, 1972
• Colonel Mint, 1972
• Gala, 1976
• The Very Rich Hours of Count von Stauffenberg, 1980
• Rat Man of Paris, 1986
• The Place in Flowers Where Pollen Rests, 1988
• Lord Byron's Doctor, 1989
• The Women of Whitechapel and Jack the Ripper, 1991
• Love's Mansion, 1992
• The Tent of Orange Mist, 1995
• Sporting with Amaryllis, 1996
• Life With Swan, 1997
• Terrestrials, 1997
• OK: The Corral, the Earps and Doc Holliday, 2000
• The Dry Danube: A Hitler Forgery, 2000
• A Fifth of November, 2001
• Cheops: A Cupboard for the Sun, 2002
• The Immensity of the Here and Now: A Novel of 9.11, 2003

Short fiction

• The Universe and Other Fictions, 1988

Poetry

• Poems, 1952
• The Spellbound Horses, 1960
• The Snow Leopard, 1964
• Alphabet Poetry
• Tea with Osiris, 2006

Non-fiction

Books

• The Growth of the Novel: Eight Radio Talks as Heard on CBC University of the Air, 1959
• Byron and the Spoiler's Art, 1960 – 2nd ed. 1992
• I, Said the Sparrow, 1963
• The Modern Novel, 1963
• Robert Penn Warren, 1964
• The Wine of Absurdity: Essays in Literature and Consolation, 1966
• Words for a Deaf Daughter, 1969
• Out of My Depths: A Swimmer in the Universe, 1983
• Sheer Fiction, 1987
• Portable People, 1990
• Sheer Fiction, vol. 2, 1991
• Sheer Fiction, vol. 3, 1994
• James Ensor, 1991
• My Mother's Music, 1996
• A Stroke of Genius: Illness and Self-Discovery, 1995
• The Secret Lives of Words, 2000
• Master Class, Scenes From A Fiction Workshop, 2001
• Oxford Days, 2002
• Sheer Fiction, vol. 4, 2004
• My Father's War, 2005
• The Shadow Factory, 2008

Edited text

• Byron: A Collection of Critical Essays (Twentieth Century Views series), 1963