author

Donald Lemen Clark

1888–1966

A Columbia scholar of English literature, he wrote influential studies that connect classical rhetoric with Renaissance writing and education. His work is still read by students interested in Milton, literary history, and the long afterlife of ancient teaching.

1 Audiobook

Rhetoric and Poetry in the Renaissance

Rhetoric and Poetry in the Renaissance

by Donald Lemen Clark

About the author

Donald Lemen Clark was an American literary scholar born in 1888. Columbia University’s archival records describe him as a professor of English literature there, and note that he earned his Ph.D. from Columbia in 1920.

His best-known books explore how classical rhetoric shaped later literature and education. Confirmed titles include Rhetoric and Poetry in the Renaissance (1922), John Milton at St. Paul's School, and Rhetoric in Greco-Roman Education (1957). These works show a steady interest in how ancient rhetorical training influenced Renaissance criticism, schools, and writers such as Milton.

Clark died in 1966. The surviving papers held by Columbia suggest a scholar with a long academic life and a wide literary circle, preserving correspondence, manuscripts, and books inscribed to him.