George Jean Nathan (February 14, 1882 – April 8, 1958) was an American

drama Drama is the specific mode of fiction represented in performance: a play, opera, mime, ballet, etc., performed in a theatre, or on radio or television.Elam (1980, 98). Considered as a genre of poetry in general, the dramatic mode has been ...

critic A critic is a person who communicates an assessment and an opinion of various forms of creative works such as art, literature, music, cinema, theater, fashion, architecture, and food. Critics may also take as their subject social or governmen ...

and

magazine editor Editing is the process of selecting and preparing written, photographic, visual, audible, or cinematic material used by a person or an entity to convey a message or information. The editing process can involve correction, condensation, orga ...

. He worked closely with

H. L. Mencken Henry Louis Mencken (September 12, 1880 – January 29, 1956) was an American journalist, essayist, satirist, cultural critic, and scholar of American English. He commented widely on the social scene, literature, music, prominent politicians, ...

, bringing the literary magazine ''

The Smart Set ''The Smart Set'' was an American literary magazine, founded by Colonel William d'Alton Mann and published from March 1900 to June 1930. Its headquarters was in New York City. During its Jazz Age heyday under the editorship of H. L. Mencken and G ...

'' to prominence as an editor, and co-founding and editing ''

The American Mercury ''The American Mercury'' was an American magazine published from 1924Staff (Dec. 31, 1923)"Bichloride of Mercury."''Time''. to 1981. It was founded as the brainchild of H. L. Mencken and drama critic George Jean Nathan. The magazine featured wri ...

'' and ''

The American Spectator ''The American Spectator'' is a conservative American magazine covering news and politics, edited by R. Emmett Tyrrell Jr. and published by the non-profit American Spectator Foundation. It was founded in 1967 by Tyrrell, who remains its editor- ...

''.

Early life

Nathan was born in

Fort Wayne, Indiana Fort Wayne is a city in and the county seat of Allen County, Indiana, United States. Located in northeastern Indiana, the city is west of the Ohio border and south of the Michigan border. The city's population was 263,886 as of the 2020 Censu ...

, the son of Ella (Nirdlinger) and Charles Naret Nathan. He graduated from

Cornell University Cornell University is a private statutory land-grant research university based in Ithaca, New York. It is a member of the Ivy League. Founded in 1865 by Ezra Cornell and Andrew Dickson White, Cornell was founded with the intention to teach an ...

in 1904. There, he was a member of the

Quill and Dagger Quill and Dagger is a senior honor society at Cornell University. It is often recognized as one of the most prominent societies of its type, along with Skull and Bones and Scroll and Key at Yale University. In 1929, ''The New York Times'' stated ...

society and an editor of the ''

Cornell Daily Sun ''The Cornell Daily Sun'' is an independent daily newspaper published in Ithaca, New York by students at Cornell University and hired employees. ''The Sun'' features coverage of the university and its environs as well as stories from the Associa ...

''. There is some evidence that Nathan was Jewish and sought (successfully) to conceal it.

Relationships and marriage

Though he published a paean to bachelorhood (''The Bachelor Life'', 1941), Nathan had a reputation as a ladies' man and was not averse to dating women working in the theater. The character of Addison De Witt, the waspish theater critic who squires a starlet (played by a then-unknown

Marilyn Monroe Marilyn Monroe (; born Norma Jeane Mortenson; 1 June 1926 4 August 1962) was an American actress. Famous for playing comedic " blonde bombshell" characters, she became one of the most popular sex symbols of the 1950s and early 1960s, as wel ...

) in the 1950 film ''

All About Eve ''All About Eve'' is a 1950 American drama film written and directed by Joseph L. Mankiewicz, and produced by Darryl F. Zanuck. It is based on the 1946 short story "The Wisdom of Eve" by Mary Orr, although Orr does not receive a screen credit ...

'' was based on Nathan. He had a romantic relationship with actress Lillian Gish, beginning in the late 1920s and lasting almost a decade. Gish repeatedly refused his proposals of marriage. Nathan eventually married considerably younger stage actress,

Julie Haydon Julie Haydon (born Donella Donaldson, June 10, 1910 – December 24, 1994) was an American Broadway, film and television actress who received second billing as the female lead in the Ben Hecht–Charles MacArthur 1935 film vehicle for Noël ...

, in 1955.

Death

Nathan died in

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 1958, aged 76.

Legacy

He wrote only one play, the one-act titled ''The Eternal Mystery,'' which premiered in 1913 at the Princess Theatre in New York.

Owen Hatteras Major Owen Hatteras (1912–1923) is a composite personage and pseudonym created and employed by H. L. Mencken and George Jean Nathan for ''The Smart Set'' literary magazine and adapted by Willard Huntington Wright during his short tenure as e ...

referenced the play as a failure when he quipped that Nathan "has forbidden the production of the play henceforth in any American city save Chicago, in which city anyone who chooses may perform it without payment of royalties." The George Jean Nathan Award, an honor in dramatic criticism, is named after him. Nathan was also inducted into the

American Theater Hall of Fame The American Theater Hall of Fame in New York City was founded in 1972. Earl Blackwell was the first head of the organization's Executive Committee. In an announcement in 1972, he said that the new ''Theater Hall of Fame'' would be located in the ...

Papers

Nathan bequeathed his letters and papers to Cornell University. Among his papers were several letters he received from

Eugene O'Neill Eugene Gladstone O'Neill (October 16, 1888 – November 27, 1953) was an American playwright and Nobel laureate in literature. His poetically titled plays were among the first to introduce into the U.S. the drama techniques of realism, earlier ...

.James Milton Highsmith: ''The Cornell Letters'', #4600-1407. Division of Rare and Manuscript Collections, Cornell University Library.

Secondary Sources

Isaac Goldberg Isaac Goldberg (1887 – July 14, 1938) was an American journalist, author, critic, translator, editor, publisher, and lecturer. Born in Boston to Jewish parents, he studied at Harvard University and received a BA degree in 1910, a MA degree in 1911 ...

: ''George Jean Nathan: A Critical Study'' (Girard, Kansas, Haldeman-Julius Company 1925. * Seymour Rudin: ''George Jean Nathan: A Study of His Criticism'' ( thaca, N.Y.1953). * Thomas F. Connolly: ''George Jean Nathan and the Making of Modern American Drama Criticism'' (Madison: Faileigh Dickinson University Press, c2000).

References

External links

* *
George Jean Nathan Award at Cornell
* * * {{DEFAULTSORT:Nathan, George Jean 1882 births 1958 deaths American magazine editors American theater critics Burials at Gate of Heaven Cemetery (Hawthorne, New York) Cornell University alumni Writers from Fort Wayne, Indiana Progressive Era in the United States Jewish American writers