Carlos Baker (May 5, 1909,

Biddeford Biddeford is a city in York County, Maine, United States. It is the principal commercial center of York County. Its population was 22,552 at the 2020 census. The twin cities of Saco and Biddeford include the resort communities of Biddeford Poo ...

Maine Maine () is a state in the New England and Northeastern regions of the United States. It borders New Hampshire to the west, the Gulf of Maine to the southeast, and the Canadian provinces of New Brunswick and Quebec to the northeast and nor ...

– April 18, 1987,

Princeton, New Jersey Princeton is a municipality with a borough form of government in Mercer County, in the U.S. state of New Jersey. It was established on January 1, 2013, through the consolidation of the Borough of Princeton and Princeton Township, both of w ...

) was an American writer, biographer and former

Woodrow Wilson Thomas Woodrow Wilson (December 28, 1856February 3, 1924) was an American politician and academic who served as the 28th president of the United States from 1913 to 1921. A member of the Democratic Party, Wilson served as the president of ...

Professor of Literature at

Princeton University Princeton University is a private research university in Princeton, New Jersey. Founded in 1746 in Elizabeth as the College of New Jersey, Princeton is the fourth-oldest institution of higher education in the United States and one of the ...

. He received his B.A. from

Dartmouth College Dartmouth College (; ) is a private research university in Hanover, New Hampshire. Established in 1769 by Eleazar Wheelock, it is one of the nine colonial colleges chartered before the American Revolution. Although founded to educate Native ...

and his M.A. from

Harvard University Harvard University is a private Ivy League research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Founded in 1636 as Harvard College and named for its first benefactor, the Puritan clergyman John Harvard, it is the oldest institution of highe ...

. He then received his Ph.D. in English from

in 1940 after completing a doctoral dissertation titled "The influence of Spencer on Shelley's major poetry." Baker's published works included several novels and books of poetry and various literary criticisms and essays. In 1969 he published the well-regarded scholarly biography of

Ernest Hemingway Ernest Miller Hemingway (July 21, 1899 – July 2, 1961) was an American novelist, short-story writer, and journalist. His economical and understated style—which he termed the iceberg theory—had a strong influence on 20th-century f ...

, ''Ernest Hemingway: A Life Story''. However, in "Selected Letters of Martha Gellhorn," (Hemingway's third wife) she criticizes Baker's assertions concerning her affair and marriage to Hemingway, and indicates that Baker was frequently wrong about those matters she experienced personally, and which Baker wrote about. Ernest Hemingway never met Baker, according to Hemingway's fourth wife,

Mary Welsh Hemingway Mary Welsh Hemingway ( Welsh; April 5, 1908 – November 26, 1986) was an American journalist and author who was the fourth wife and widow of Ernest Hemingway. Early life Born in Walker, Minnesota, Welsh was a daughter of a lumberman. In 1938, ...

, who also asserts in her 1976 book "How It Was" that Hemingway deliberately chose someone who never knew him. Mary does not offer a specific reason for this choice, but Baker had published "Hemingway: The Writer as Artist" in 1952, which favorably treated Hemingway's work to that date. Baker's other major works include biographies of

Percy Bysshe Shelley Percy Bysshe Shelley ( ; 4 August 17928 July 1822) was one of the major English Romantic poets. A radical in his poetry as well as in his political and social views, Shelley did not achieve fame during his lifetime, but recognition of his achi ...

and

Ralph Waldo Emerson Ralph Waldo Emerson (May 25, 1803April 27, 1882), who went by his middle name Waldo, was an American essayist, lecturer, philosopher, abolitionist, and poet who led the transcendentalist movement of the mid-19th century. He was seen as a cham ...

. Baker taught biographer A. Scott Berg while Berg was an undergraduate at Princeton in the late 1960s. Berg recalled that Baker "changed my life," and convinced him to quit acting to concentrate on his thesis, a study of editor Maxwell Perkins.Merritt, J. I.
"Biographer A. Scott Berg '71 confronts the remarkable -- and still controversial -- flier, 'a great lens for observing the American century'"
PAW, 1998-11-18. Retrieved on 2007-10-30. Berg eventually expanded his thesis into the

National Book Award The National Book Awards are a set of annual U.S. literary awards. At the final National Book Awards Ceremony every November, the National Book Foundation presents the National Book Awards and two lifetime achievement awards to authors. The Nat ...

-winning biography '' Max Perkins: Editor of Genius'' (1978), which he dedicated in part to Baker. Baker was elected to the

American Philosophical Society The American Philosophical Society (APS), founded in 1743 in Philadelphia, is a scholarly organization that promotes knowledge in the sciences and humanities through research, professional meetings, publications, library resources, and communit ...

in 1982.

References

External links

''New York Times'' obituary
of Baker {{DEFAULTSORT:Baker, Carlos 1909 births 1987 deaths Dartmouth College alumni missing graduation year Harvard University alumni Princeton University alumni People from Biddeford, Maine Princeton University faculty American literary critics 20th-century American non-fiction writers Novelists from Maine Novelists from New Jersey Members of the American Philosophical Society