Helen Weaver (June 18, 1931 – April 13, 2021) was an American writer and translator. She translated over fifty books from French. ''Antonin Artaud: Selected Writings'' was a Finalist for 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 ...

in translation in 1977. Weaver was the general editor, a contributor and a translator for the ''Larousse Encyclopedia of Astrology'' (1980). In 2001 she published ''The Daisy Sutra'', a book on animal communication. In 2009 Weaver published ''The Awakener: A Memoir of Kerouac and the Fifties''.

Jack Kerouac Jean-Louis Lebris de Kérouac (; March 12, 1922 – October 21, 1969), known as Jack Kerouac, was an American novelist and poet who, alongside William S. Burroughs and Allen Ginsberg, was a pioneer of the Beat Generation. Of French-Canadian a ...

(1922–1969) was a prominent writer and poet of the

Beat Generation The Beat Generation was a literary subculture movement started by a group of authors whose work explored and influenced American culture and politics in the post-war era. The bulk of their work was published and popularized by Silent Generatio ...

. In her review in ''The New York Times'',

Tara McKelvey Tara Shannon McKelvey is an American journalist who is a White House reporter for the BBC and a former correspondent for ''Newsweek/The Daily Beast''. She has reported on topics which include national-security issues from the Middle East, South A ...

wrote "Kerouac’s soul lives on through many people — Joyce Johnson, for one — but few have been as adept as Weaver at capturing both him and the New York bohemia of the time. He was lucky to have met her."

Biography

Helen Weaver grew up in Scarsdale, New York. Her father,

Warren Weaver Warren Weaver (July 17, 1894 – November 24, 1978) was an American scientist, mathematician, and science administrator. He is widely recognized as one of the pioneers of machine translation and as an important figure in creating support for scien ...

, was a scientist, author, and world traveler who was Director of Natural Sciences at the

Rockefeller Foundation The Rockefeller Foundation is an American private foundation and philanthropic medical research and arts funding organization based at 420 Fifth Avenue, New York City. The second-oldest major philanthropic institution in America, after the Carneg ...

for twenty-seven years. Her mother, Mary Hemenway Weaver, taught Latin and ancient history. Weaver graduated magna cum laude from Oberlin College with a B.A. in English Literature in 1952. She married Oberlin classmate James Pierce in 1952; they divorced in 1955. Her brother, Warren Weaver, Jr., was a political reporter on the Washington bureau of

The New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid ...

. Weaver's website. In 1956 she met the writer Jack Kerouac, and they fell in love. Although the relationship did not last, it was immortalised in books written by both of them. Weaver often received drunken phone calls from Kerouac after they had parted. She would always tell him to phone back in the morning, but he never did. However, she made notes of what was said in every call, and collected clippings about him. Eventually she compiled everything into the book ''The Awakener: A Memoir of Kerouac and the Fifties.''

Death

Weaver died on April 13, 2021, at her home in Woodstock, New York. She was 89.

Selected translations

* Translation of The novel was the basis for the film ''

The Day of the Dolphin ''The Day of the Dolphin'' is a 1973 American science fiction thriller film directed by Mike Nichols and starring George C. Scott. Based on the 1967 novel '' Un animal doué de raison'' (lit. ''A Sentient Animal''), by French writer Robert Merle, ...

'' (1973). * This novel about the 1943 uprising at the Treblinka concentration camp during

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...

was a bestseller in France; see also

Jean-François Steiner Jean-François Steiner is a French-Jewish writer born on 17 February 1938 in Paris, France. He is the son of Kadmi Cohen (1892–1944), a French lawyer and writer who died at the concentration camp of Gleiwitz. In 1952 he was adopted, together w ...

. * Japrisot, Sébastien (1965) Trap for Cinderella, Simon & Schuster * Japrisot, Sébastien (1967) The Lady in the Car with Glasses and a Gun, Simon & Schuster * Translation of

References

External links

*
Description, reviews and purchasing information for The Awakener
{{DEFAULTSORT:Weaver, Helen 1931 births 2021 deaths Oberlin College alumni People from Madison, Wisconsin American translators American women writers 21st-century American women