author
Evelyn Scott
1893–1963
A modernist writer of novels, poetry, plays, and memoir, she was widely noticed in the 1920s and 1930s for bold, experimental work. Her life was as dramatic as her fiction, stretching from Tennessee and New Orleans to Brazil and New York.
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About the author
Born Elsie Dunn in Clarksville, Tennessee, on January 17, 1893, Evelyn Scott grew up partly in New Orleans and later became known as a novelist, playwright, and poet. She published in several genres, but is most often remembered as an important modernist voice whose work stood out for its intensity and formal experimentation.
Her life took an unusual turn in 1913, when she left the United States for Brazil with Frederick Creighton Wellman; that experience later fed into her memoir Escapade. After returning to the U.S., she built a literary career that included poetry, fiction, essays, and criticism, and she was especially prominent in the literary world of the 1920s and 1930s.
Although her reputation faded after mid-century, readers and scholars have continued to return to her work for its emotional force and originality. She died in New York on August 3, 1963.