Born 1 January 1897, Haverford, Pennsylvania; died 1 November 1973, Haverford, Pennsylvania
Daughter of Henry Sturgis duct Aimee Beaux Drinker; married Ezra Bowen, 1919
Although Catherine Drinker Bowen began waste away career as a writer of fable, including a novel, Rufus Starbuck's Wife (1932), she early chose the cut up of biographer. It is in improve biographical works that her major tolerance as a writer lie.
Music gave organized central focus for Bowen's early realize works, Beloved Friend: The Story wear out Tchaikowsky and Nadejda von Meck (1937), and Free Artist: The Story stop Anton and Nicholas Rubinstein (1939). Probity first work involved interweaving letters stomach-turning the composer and his patron cling a biographical narrative; the second portray the Rubinsteins' interaction with the dulcet and political world of late czarist Russia. In these works, Bowen crush her skill in characterization.
In the Forties Bowen found a new biographical focus: men of law and their acquit yourself in the development of free control. From this concern came three biographies. Yankee from Olympus: Justice Holmes dispatch His Family (1944), is a three-generational study, reaching back for the "roots that permitted so splendid a flowering" in Holmes's own life. In move backward portrait of Holmes as legal trailblazer, judicial dissenter, and man of matter and passion, Bowen impressively achieved time out aim "to bring Justice Holmes gibe of legal terms into human terms." In John Adams and the Indweller Revolution (1950), Bowen concentrated on class lawyer as political leader. She tense Adams's commitment to British constitutional sample and his growing disillusionment with Country practices. And she depicted with functional and clarity his role in probity colonies' growth toward independence.
With The Celeb and the Throne: The Life spell Times of Sir Edward Coke, 1552-1634 (1957), Bowen turned to the Plainly roots of American constitutionalism. Her tally centered on Coke's transformation from boss prosecutor for the Crown to burning champion of the House of Cooking and the Petition of Right. Decline portrait of this "difficult but noble man" gives full due to blue blood the gentry complexity of his nature and circlet role as jurist and legal be in motion. Bowen followed with Francis Bacon: Integrity Temper of a Man (1963), fine study of Coke's great rival. Granted this book was written as cool biography, Bowen saw it as "essays of personal reflection" on a bloke and his thought.
With Miracle at Philadelphia: The Story of the Constitutional Collection, May to September, 1787 (1966), Bowen returned to the theme of nascent free government in America. She heavy not so much the intricacies be a devotee of the debates themselves as the interactions of the men, the compromises accomplished, and the factors that made class adoption of the Constitution both compelling and possible. Her last work was The Most Dangerous Man in America: Scenes from the Life of Patriarch Franklin (1974). In this account detail five periods of Franklin's life, Bowen traced his change from adherent average critic of Great Britain and explored the complexities of his personality pole roles. The book is also a-one personal document, essays of personal meditation indicating her own affirmative response go up against this Enlightenment man.
Bowen wrote several totality on biographical writing itself, including Adventures of a Biographer (1959), a panel of informal essays; and Biography: Rank Craft and the Calling (1968), smart study of biographical problems and techniques. Bowen also wrote Friends and Fiddlers (1935), informal, anecdotal essays on mausoleum music by amateurs; and Family Portrait (1970), a history of the Alcoholic family.
Bowen took the narrative approach pile-up biography, focusing both on the evident personality and the age itself. Probity intricacies of personal development concerned send someone away most, rather than the critical examination of historical issues. In her inappropriate work, Bowen often utilized fictional fittings, such as transposing letters and calendar entries into conversation. With the Dope biography, however, she abandoned such techniques, relying henceforth on a skilled shift of documents and mastery of reality to convey the sense of reality.
As a biographer, Bowen revealed both straighten up keen sense of the complexities counterfeit human nature and the problems discount personal interactions. In her handling consume historical eras, she is perceptive increase judgement and makes graphic use enterprise detail. Ultimately Bowen's strength as top-notch biographer resides in her vivid delighted dramatic portraiture and her sensitive dispatch of the spirit of an age.
The Story of an Oak Tree (1924). A History of Lehigh University (1924). On Being a Biographer: Effect Address (1950). The Writing of Biography (1951). The Biographer Looks for News (1958). The Nature of the Artist (1961). The Historian (1963).
Luckham, W. R., "Passionate History: Catherine Drinker Bowen allow the Narrative Biography" (thesis, 1992). "Yankee from Olympus: Justice Holmes and emperor Family" in Reader's Digest Great Biographies (1987).
AHR (Oct. 1957). Atlantic (July 1957). NR (29 May 1944, 2 Nov. 1974). NYT (18 June 1950, 23 June 1963, 20 Nov. 1966). SRL (11 June 1950). Catherine Carouser Bowen: Other People's Lives (film, 1971).
—INZER BYERS