James Thurber

(December 8, 1894 November 2, 1961)

Life

Thurber was born inColumbus, Ohio

Son of Charles L. Thurber and Mary Agnes "Mame" (ne Fisher)
Thurber
Born on December 8, 1894.
His father was an employed clerk and minor politician
Has 2 brothers which are William and Robert.
Lost one of his eye while playing William Tell ( a game where
they shoot an apple off one's head). This would later cause him
to almost become entirely blind.
Unable in his childhood to partake in sports and other activities
because of his injury, he elaborated a creative mind which he
then used to express himself in writings.

 From 1913 to 1918, Thurber attendedThe Ohio State University

but he could not graduate because of his poor eyesight.
In 1927, Thurber moved toGreenwich Villagein New York City,
getting a job as a reporter for theNew York Evening Post, with
the help ofE.B. White, his friend and fellowNew
Yorkercontributor.
Thurber's career as a cartoonist began in 1930 after White
found some of Thurber's drawings in a trash can and submitted
them for publication; White inked-in some of these earlier
drawings to make them reproduce better for the magazine.
Thurber contributed both his writings and his drawings toThe
New Yorkeruntil the 1950s.

 Thurber was married twice. In 1922, Thurber married Althea

Adams. The marriage was troubled and ended in divorce in May
1935.They had a daughter Rosemary together, and lived
inFairfield County, Connecticut.
He remarried in June 1935 to Helen Wismer (19021986)
Thurber was stricken with a blood clot on the brain on October
4, 1961, and underwent emergency surgery.
The operation was successful, but he died, aged 66, due to
complications frompneumoniawhich set in.
His last words, aside from the repeated word "God," were "God
bless... God damn", according to his wife, Helen.

Career
Many of his short stories are humorous fictional memoirs from
his life, but he also wrote darker material, such as "The WhipPoor-Will", a story of madness and murder. His best-known
short stories are "The Dog That Bit People" and"The Night the
Bed Fell"; they can be found inMy Life and Hard Times, which
was his "break-out" book.
Among his other classics areThe Secret Life of Walter
Mitty,The Catbird Seat,A Couple of Hamburgers,The Greatest
Man in the World.
Thurber wrote over seventy-fivefables, some of which were
first published in "The New Yorker" (1939), then collected
inFables for Our Time & Famous Poems Illustrated(1940)
andFurther Fables for Our Time(1956).

 These were short, featured anthropomorphic animals (e.g.The

Little Girl and the Wolf, his version ofLittle Red Riding Hood) as
main characters, and ended with a moral as a tagline.
An exception to this format was his most famous fable,The
Unicorn in the Garden, which featured an all-human cast except
for the unicorn, which doesn't speak.
His stories also included several book-length fairy tales, such
asThe White Deer(1945),The 13 Clocks(1950) andThe
Wonderful O(1957). The latter was one of several of Thurber's
works illustrated byMarc Simont.

Legacy and honours

Established in 1997, the annual Thurber Prize honors
outstanding examples of American humor.
In 2008, The Library of America selected Thurber's
story, " A Sort of Genius", first published in The New
Yorker, for inclusion in its two-century retrospective of
American True Crime.
Two of his residences have been listed on the
U.S. National Register of Historic Places: his
childhood Thurber House in Ohio and the SanfordCurtis-Thurber House inFairfield County, Connecticut.

Works
BOOKS

Is Sex Necessary? or, Why You Feel The Way You Do, (1929 with E. B. White), 75th anniv.
edition (2004) with foreword by John Updike

The Owl in the Attic and Other Perplexities, 1931

The Seal in the Bedroom and Other Predicaments, 1932

My Life and Hard Times,

The Middle-Aged Man on the Flying Trapeze, 1935

Let Your Mind Alone! and Other More Or Less Inspirational Pieces, 1937

The Last Flower, 1939, reissued 2007

The Male Animal (stage play), 1939 (with Elliott Nugent) and screenplay starring Henry Fonda,
written by Stephen Morehouse Avery

Fables for Our Time and Famous Poems Illustrated, 1940

My World And Welcome To It, 1942

Men, Women and Dogs, 1943

The Thurber Carnival (anthology), 1945, ISBN 0-06-093287-2, ISBN 0-394-600851 (Modern Library Edition)

The Beast in Me and Other Animals, 1948 ISBN 0-15-610850-X

The Thurber Album, 1952

Thurber Country, 1953

Thurber's Dogs, 1955

Further Fables For Our Time, 1956

Alarms and Diversions (anthology), 1957

The Years With Ross, 1959 ISBN 0-06-095971-1

A Thurber Carnival (stage play), 1960

Lanterns and Lances, 1961

CHILDREN'S BOOK

Many Moons, (children) 1943 (later condensed as The Princess Who

Wanted The Moon)

The Great Quillow, (children) 1944

The White Deer, (children) 1945

The 13 Clocks, (children) 1950

The Wonderful O, (children) 1957

Thurber On Crime, 1991 (ed. Robert Lopresti)

People Have More Fun Than Anybody: A Centennial Celebration

of Drawings and Writings by James Thurber, 1994 (ed. Michael J.
Rosen)

James Thurber: Writings and Drawings (anthology), 1996,

(ed. Garrison Keillor), Library of America, ISBN 978-1-883011-22-2

The Dog Department: James Thurber on Hounds, Scotties, and

Talking Poodles, 2001 (ed. Michael J. Rosen)

The Thurber Letters, 2002 (ed. Harrison Kinney, with Rosemary A.

Thurber)

Short stories

"The Man Who Hated Moonbaum"

"The Secret Life of Walter Mitty"

"The Night the Bed Fell"

"The Unicorn in the Garden"

"The Moth and the Star"

"The Rabbits Who Caused All the Trouble"

"The Macbeth Murder Mystery", 1937 (printed in The New Yorker)

"You Could Look It Up", 1941

 "The Catbird Seat", 1942

"The Secret Life of James Thurber", 1943
"The Breaking up of the Winships", 1945
"A Couple of Hamburgers"
"The Greatest Man in the World"
"The Cane in the Corridor"
"If Grant Had Been Drinking at Appomattox"
"The Bear Who Let It Alone"

 "The Princess and the Tin Box"

"The Dog that Bit People"
"The Lady on 142"
"The Remarkable Case of Mr.Bruhl"
"The Scotty Who Knew Too Much"
"The Night the Ghost Got In"

Posthumous books

Credos and Curios, 1962 (ed. Helen W. Thurber)

Thurber & Company, 1966 (ed. Helen W. Thurber)

Selected Letters of James Thurber, 1981 (ed. Helen W. Thurber &

Edward Weeks)

Collecting Himself: James Thurber on Writing and Writers, Humor

and Himself, 1989 (ed. Michael J. Rosen)