Leslie Fiedler


Leslie Aaron Fiedler was an American literary critic, known for his interest in mythography and his championing of genre fiction. His work incorporates the application Psychological theories to American literature. Fiedler most renowned work consists of Love and Death in the American Novel. A retrospective article on Leslie Fiedler in the New York Times Book Review in 1965 referred to Love and Death in the American Novel as "one of the great, essential books on the American imagination... an accepted major work." This groundbreaking work views in depth both American literature and character from the time of the American Revolution to the present. From it, there emerges Fiedler's once scandalous—now increasingly accepted—judgement that our literature is incapable of dealing with adult sexuality and is pathologically obsessed with death.

Life

Early years

Fiedler was born in Newark, New Jersey, to Jewish parents Lillian and Jacob Fiedler. "Eliezar Aaron" was his original Hebrew name. In his early years, he developed a strong connection to his grandparents, He attended South Side High School.

Career

Fiedler was offered a postdoctoral fellowship at Harvard University by the Rockefeller Foundation.

The 1980s and beyond

In the 1990s, Fiedler's output decreased and new material was sporadic. In 1994, Fiedler received the Hubbell Medal for lifetime contribution to the study of literature. In 1998, Fiedler was given the National Book Critics Circle Ivan Sandrof Lifetime Achievement Award. On January 29, 2003, a month before his 86th birthday, he died in Buffalo, where he is buried at the Forest Lawn Cemetery.

Works