William Edmund Barrett
William Edmund Barrett (November 16, 1900, New York – September 14, 1986, Denver ) was an American writer, best known for the 1962 novella The Lilies of the Field.
Life
[edit]Barrett was born in New York City November 16, 1900, to John Joseph and Eleanor Margaret (Flannery) Barrett. His family was Roman Catholic.[1] In 1916, he and his family moved to Denver, Colorado. He returned east to attend Manhattan College, from which he was graduated in 1922.
Barrett spent most of his life in Denver.[2] From 1923 to 1929 he worked as the Rocky Mountain advertising manager for Westinghouse. He married Christine M. Rollman on February 15, 1925.[3]
Deeply interested in aviation, he was a civilian lecturer for the United States Air Force, and worked as an aeronautics consultant with the Denver Public Library[2] from 1941 on. He received a citation from Regis College in 1956.
Writing
[edit]In a writing career that spanned over 50 years, Barrett's works include short stories, biographies, novels, reviews and non-fiction. In 1929, he began writing freelance for pulp magazines. His first novel, Woman on Horseback was published in 1938. In 1964, he wrote Shepherd of Mankind, a biography of Pope Paul VI.[1]
He was a member of PEN and the Authors League of America. In 1961, he received an Honorary Doctor of Literature degree from Creighton University.[3] He was a member of the National Press Club of Washington, D.C., and the Colorado Authors League, serving as its president from 1943 to 1944.
Three of his novels were made into films:
- The Left Hand of God, starring Humphrey Bogart
- Lilies of the Field based on his novel The Lilies of the Field, featuring Sidney Poitier
- Pieces of Dreams, based on The Wine and the Music, the story of a Roman Catholic priest who decides to marry a Protestant divorcee.
Barrett had been in poor health after suffering a heart attack and died in his sleep in Denver September 14, 1986 at the age of eighty-five.[4]
Bibliography
[edit]
- Woman on Horseback (1938)
- Flight from Youth (1939)
- Aviation as a Business (1945)
- The Evil Heart (1946)
- The Number of My Days (1946)
- To the Last Man (1948)
- The Left Hand of God (1951)
- Shadows of the Images (1953)
- The Sudden Strangers (1956)
- The Empty Shrine (1958)
- The First War Planes (1960)
- The Edge of Things (1960)
- The Lilies of the Field (1962)
- The Fools of Time (1963)
- The Shepherd of Mankind (1964)
- The Glory Tent (1967)
- The Red Lacquered Gate (1967)
- The Wine and the Music (also under the title Pieces of Dreams) (1968)
- A Woman in the House (1971)
- The Shape of Illusion (1972)
- Lady of the Lotus (1975)
See also
[edit]References
[edit]- ^ a b "William E. Barrett dies at 85; Author of 'Lilies of the Field'", The New York Times, September 17,, 1986
- ^ a b King, David A., "The heart of Barrett’s ‘The Lilies of the Field’", The Georgia Bulletin, March 20, 2014
- ^ a b "Barrett, William E." snac
- ^ "Author William E. Barrett Dies at 85", Los Angeles Times, September 17, 1986
External links
[edit]
- 1900 births
- 1986 deaths
- 20th-century American male writers
- 20th-century American novelists
- 20th-century Roman Catholics
- American male novelists
- Catholics from Colorado
- Catholics from New York (state)
- Manhattan College alumni
- Novelists from Colorado
- Novelists from New York (state)
- Writers from Denver
- Writers from New York City