Varley Lang

Before turning fully to the Chesapeake Bay world he wrote about, Varley Howe Lang taught English at Johns Hopkins and New York State Teachers' College. A historical society catalog describing his correspondence says he later returned to the water and became known for writing about watermen and their environment.

His books include Follow the Water and The Stars Are Small, and he is also credited with Crabbe and the Eighteenth Century. Under the shorter name Varley Lang, he published the science-fiction story Ecology on Rollins Island, which has remained available through Project Gutenberg.

Reliable biographical detail on Lang is limited online, but the available records suggest an unusual writing life shaped by both academia and working experience on the Eastern Shore of Maryland. That combination helps explain why his writing can feel both thoughtful and grounded in the physical world.