Donald Windham (July 2, 1920 – May 31, 2010) was an American novelist and memoirist. He is perhaps best known for his close friendships with

Truman Capote Truman Garcia Capote ( ; born Truman Streckfus Persons; September 30, 1924 – August 25, 1984) was an American novelist, screenwriter, playwright and actor. Several of his short stories, novels, and plays have been praised as literary classics, ...

and

Tennessee Williams Thomas Lanier Williams III (March 26, 1911 – February 25, 1983), known by his pen name Tennessee Williams, was an American playwright and screenwriter. Along with contemporaries Eugene O'Neill and Arthur Miller, he is considered among the thre ...

. Born in

Atlanta, Georgia Atlanta ( ) is the capital and most populous city of the U.S. state of Georgia. It is the seat of Fulton County, the most populous county in Georgia, but its territory falls in both Fulton and DeKalb counties. With a population of 498,715 ...

, Windham moved with his then-boyfriend Fred Melton, an artist, to

New York City New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the List of United States cities by population, most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the L ...

in 1939. In 1942 Windham collaborated with Williams on the play, ''You Touched Me''!, which is based on a

D. H. Lawrence David Herbert Lawrence (11 September 1885 – 2 March 1930) was an English writer, novelist, poet and essayist. His works reflect on modernity, industrialization, sexuality, emotional health, vitality, spontaneity and instinct. His best-k ...

short story with the same title. Windham received a

Guggenheim Fellowship Guggenheim Fellowships are grants that have been awarded annually since by the John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation to those "who have demonstrated exceptional capacity for productive scholarship or exceptional creative ability in the ar ...

in 1960. Windham became estranged from Williams after Williams published his book ''Memoirs'' (1975). Windham later published a volume of their correspondence, which Williams claimed was done without his permission. Windham remained a friend of Capote until Capote's death. Windham also met and befriended such diverse figures as

Lincoln Kirstein Lincoln Edward Kirstein (May 4, 1907 – January 5, 1996) was an American writer, impresario, art connoisseur, philanthropist, and cultural figure in New York City, noted especially as co-founder of the New York City Ballet. He developed and sus ...

Pavel Tchelitchew Pavel Fyodorovich Tchelitchew ( ; russian: Па́вел Фёдорович Чели́щев) ( – 31 July 1957) was a Russian-born surrealist painter, set designer and costume designer. Early life Tchelitchew was born to an aristocratic famil ...

Paul Cadmus Paul Cadmus (December 17, 1904 – December 12, 1999) was an American artist widely known for his egg tempera paintings of gritty social interactions in urban settings. He also produced many highly finished drawings of single nude male figures ...

Gore Vidal Eugene Luther Gore Vidal (; born Eugene Louis Vidal, October 3, 1925 – July 31, 2012) was an American writer and public intellectual known for his epigrammatic wit, erudition, and patrician manner. Vidal was bisexual, and in his novels and ...

Christopher Isherwood Christopher William Bradshaw Isherwood (26 August 1904 – 4 January 1986) was an Anglo-American novelist, playwright, screenwriter, autobiographer, and diarist. His best-known works include '' Goodbye to Berlin'' (1939), a semi-autobiographical ...

and

Montgomery Clift Edward Montgomery Clift (; October 17, 1920 – July 23, 1966) was an American actor. A four-time Academy Award nominee, he was known for his portrayal of "moody, sensitive young men", according to ''The New York Times''. He is best remembered ...

, who became a lover of Windham's during the 1940s. In 1943, Windham met Sandy Campbell, an undergraduate student at

Princeton University Princeton University is a private university, private research university in Princeton, New Jersey. Founded in 1746 in Elizabeth, New Jersey, Elizabeth as the College of New Jersey, Princeton is the List of Colonial Colleges, fourth-oldest ins ...

. In 1943 they began a relationship that would last until Campbell's death in 1988. Campbell frequently helped Windham publish books through the Stamperia Valdonega in

Verona Verona ( , ; vec, Verona or ) is a city on the Adige River in Veneto, Northern Italy, Italy, with 258,031 inhabitants. It is one of the seven provincial capitals of the region. It is the largest city Comune, municipality in the region and the ...

, Italy. Partially because Windham was influenced by his own life,

homosexuality Homosexuality is romantic attraction, sexual attraction, or sexual behavior between members of the same sex or gender. As a sexual orientation, homosexuality is "an enduring pattern of emotional, romantic, and/or sexual attractions" to peop ...

is one of many themes treated in his work. Windham's novels include ''

The Dog Star ''The Dog Star'' is a novel by American writer Donald Windham, first published in 1950. It tells the story of a young Southern man who is haunted by the suicide of his best friend from reform school. Set in 1930s post- Depression Atlanta, the n ...

'' (1950),Windham, Donald. ''The dog star''. Doubleday (1950) which was praised by

André Gide André Paul Guillaume Gide (; 22 November 1869 – 19 February 1951) was a French author and winner of the Nobel Prize in Literature (in 1947). Gide's career ranged from its beginnings in the Symbolism (arts), symbolist movement, to the advent o ...

and

Thomas Mann Paul Thomas Mann ( , ; ; 6 June 1875 – 12 August 1955) was a German novelist, short story writer, social critic, philanthropist, essayist, and the 1929 Nobel Prize in Literature laureate. His highly symbolic and ironic epic novels and novella ...

, ''The Hero Continues'' (1960), which is likely based on Williams, ''Two People'' (1965) which is about a love affair between a New York stockbroker whose wife has left him and a 17-year-old Italian boy in Rome, and ''Tanaquil'' (1972), which is based on the life of

George Platt Lynes George Platt Lynes (April 15, 1907 – December 6, 1955) was an American fashion photography, fashion and advertising, commercial photographer who worked in the 1930s and 1940s. He produced photographs featuring many gay artists and writers from ...

. In the 1960s, Windham published a series of recollections about his childhood in the ''

New Yorker New Yorker or ''variant'' primarily refers to: * A resident of the State of New York ** Demographics of New York (state) * A resident of New York City ** List of people from New York City * ''The New Yorker'', a magazine founded in 1925 * ''The New ...

''. These were collected in the autobiography ''

Emblems of Conduct ''Emblems of Conduct'' is a book by American writer Donald Windham, first published in 1963. It is a personal memoir, an account of his early life in Atlanta. Background After publishing ''The Hero Continues'', a novel based on the life of Tenn ...

'', published in 1964. The book was warmly received. ''Lost Friendships'', a memoir of his friendship with Capote and Williams, was published in 1987. It is regarded by some as his best book. In June 2011 it was announced that

Yale University Yale University is a private research university in New Haven, Connecticut. Established in 1701 as the Collegiate School, it is the third-oldest institution of higher education in the United States and among the most prestigious in the wo ...

would administer the Donald Windham-Sandy M. Campbell Literature Prizes.

References

*Kellner, Bruce. ''Donald Windham: A Bio-Bibliography''. Greenwood Press, 1991.

External links

Donald Windham: A Full Length Portrait of the Writer

* Donald Windham and Sandy Campbell Papers. Yale Collection of American Literature, Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library. *Donald Windham materials i
Robert A. Wilson collection
fro
Special Collections, University of Delaware Library
{{DEFAULTSORT:Windham, Donald 1920 births 2010 deaths 20th-century American novelists American male novelists 20th-century American memoirists Lambda Literary Award winners American gay writers American LGBT novelists LGBT people from Georgia (U.S. state) Writers from Atlanta 20th-century American male writers Novelists from Georgia (U.S. state) American male non-fiction writers 21st-century American LGBT people