author
William Lyon Phelps
1865–1943
Best known for bringing the modern novel into the American classroom, this lively Yale professor turned literary criticism into something broad audiences could enjoy. He wrote widely, lectured often, and helped make contemporary literature feel accessible and exciting.
6 Audiobooks
Robert Browning: How to Know Him
by William Lyon Phelps
Essays on Russian Novelists
by William Lyon Phelps
Essays on things
by William Lyon Phelps
Archibald Marshall, a Realistic Novelist
by William Lyon Phelps
Essays on Modern Novelists
by William Lyon Phelps
The Advance of English Poetry in the Twentieth Century
by William Lyon Phelps
About the author
Born in New Haven, Connecticut, in 1865, William Lyon Phelps became one of the best-known American literary scholars of his time. He studied at Yale, earned a master's degree from Harvard, then returned to Yale, where he taught for decades and became especially associated with English literature and public literary culture.
He is often remembered for teaching what is described as the first American university course on the modern novel. Beyond campus, he reached a much wider audience through books, essays, lectures, a newspaper column, and radio, building a reputation as a critic who could speak clearly and warmly to general readers.
Phelps died in 1943 in New Haven. His lasting reputation rests on the way he helped popularize the serious study of contemporary literature while keeping it welcoming to non-specialists.