Louis Stanton Auchincloss (/ˈɔːkɪŋklɒs/; September 27, 1917 – January 26, 2010)[1] was an American lawyer, novelist, historian, and essayist. He is best known as a novelist who parlayed his experiences into books exploring the experiences and psychology of Americanpolite society andold money. His dry, ironic works of fiction continue the tradition ofHenry James andEdith Wharton.[2][3] He wrote his novels initially under the nameAndrew Lee,[4] the name of an ancestor who cursed any descendant who drank or smoked.[5]
Born inLawrence,New York, Auchincloss was the son of Priscilla Dixon (née Stanton) and Joseph Howland Auchincloss.[6] His brother was Howland Auchincloss and his paternal grandfather, John Winthrop Auchincloss, was the brother of Edgar Stirling Auchincloss (father ofJames C. Auchincloss) and Hugh Dudley Auchincloss (father ofHugh D. Auchincloss, Jr.).[7][8] He grew up among the privileged people about whom he would write, although, as he put it, "There was never an Auchincloss fortune ... each generation of Auchincloss men either made or married its own money".
Auchincloss was an associate atSullivan & Cromwell from 1941 to 1951 (with an interruption for war service from 1942 to 1945 in theUnited States Navy duringWorld War II, which might have inspired his 1947 novelThe Indifferent Children). He applied to join the Naval Reserve as an intelligence specialist on December 4, 1940 and was appointed as a lieutenant on December 1, 1942.[9]
After taking a break to pursue full-time writing,[10] Auchincloss returned to working as a lawyer, first as an associate (1954–58) and then as a partner (1958–86) at Hawkins, Delafield and Wood in New York City as a wills and trusts attorney, while writing at the rate of a book a year.
Auchincloss is known for his closely observed portraits of old New York and New England society. Among his books are the multi-generational sagasThe House of Five Talents (1960),Portrait in Brownstone (1962), andEast Side Story (2004).The Rector of Justin (1964) is the tale of a renownedheadmaster of a prep school like the one he attended, Groton School,[11] trying to deal with changing times.
In the early 1980s, Auchincloss produced three novels which were not centered on the New York he knew so well, i.e.The Cat and the King, set in Louis XIV's Versailles;Watchfires, concerned with the American Civil War; andExit Lady Masham, set in Queen Anne's England. Auchincloss would remain close to New York again, however, in his later fiction writing.
Gore Vidal said of his work: "Of all our novelists, Auchincloss is the only one who tells us how our rulers behave in their banks and their boardrooms, their law offices and their clubs ... Not sinceDreiser has an American writer had so much to tell us about the role of money in our lives."[12]
In his youth, Auchincloss was a "aRoosevelt-hating conservative."[19] Once, while attendingYale, he waved a sunflower (the symbol of RepublicanAlf Landon) at President Roosevelt's passing motorcade. Auchincloss wrote conservative articles inVirginia Law Review, which have been described as expressing "a nostalgic and romantic idealism".[20]
In his adult life, Auchincloss was a registeredRepublican.[21] However, he voted for DemocratBill Clinton explaining, "I think we're moving dangerously into a have and have not situation ... for the first time in 150 years the rich are sneering at the poor."[22]
Auchincloss described theBush family as "a big family of shits." He explained his decision to receive theNational Medal of the Arts from PresidentGeorge W. Bush, saying, "I didn't accept a prize from George W. Bush, I accepted a prize from the President of the United States. Who am I to turn that down?"[21]
Auchincloss'sThe Great World and Timothy Colt (1956) was adapted for television in an episode of theClimax! series (Season 4, Episode 22; Broadcast 27 March 1958). ComposerPaul Reif adaptedPortrait in Brownstone into an opera upon which he was working at the time of his death;[29] it has remained unperformed.[30]
^In an essay discussing his novelThe Rector of Justin, Auchincloss says he modeled the main character not on an actual boarding school headmaster but on "the greatest man it has been my good luck to know--"Judge Learned Hand.SeeOrigin of a Hero, inAuchincloss, Louis (1979).Life, Law, and Letters: Essays and Sketches. Houghton Mifflin.ISBN0-395-28151-2.
