Walter Van Tilburg Clark
Walter Van Tilburg Clark (Aug. 3, 1909â€"Nov. 10, 1971) was a writer of short stories, poetry and novels, best known for his first novel,
The Ox-Bow Incident.
Born in
East Orland, Maine, Clark grew up and went to college in
Reno, where his father was president of the
University of Nevada. In 1933 Clark married and moved to
Cazenovia, New York, where he taught high school English and began his fiction-writing career.
The Ox-Bow Incident, published in 1940, was well-received and gave Clark a level of literary acclaim that was unusual for a writer of
Westerns. In 1943 it was adapted into a movie starring
Henry Fonda. Clark published two more novels,
The City of Trembling Leaves and
The Track of the Cat, and a collection of his short stories over the next decade, which were also well-received. Although he continued to write prolifically after 1950, Clark published very little. He took several academic positions, including returning to Reno to serve as the writer-in-residence at the university from 1962 until his death in Reno, Nov. in 1971.
Novels
The Ox-Bow Incident (1940)
The City of Trembling Leaves (1945)
The Track of the Cat (1949)
Short Story Collections
The Watchful Gods (1950)
The Portable Phonograph*[
1] entry on Clark in the
Nevada Writers Hall of Fame.
