Maxwell Anderson

• 1. Childhood Illness And Storytelling

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  James Maxwell Anderson entered the world on the 15th of December 1888, in Atlantic, Pennsylvania. He was the second of eight children born to William Lincoln Anderson and Charlotte Perrimela Stephenson. His family moved frequently across rural Pennsylvania and Ohio as his father sought ministerial posts. This constant relocation meant young Maxwell missed significant amounts of school due to frequent illnesses. While bedridden with sickness, he read voraciously through stacks of books. Both his parents and Aunt Emma were storytellers who spun tales for him during these long convalescences. These stories fostered a deep love for literature that would define his future career. At age eleven, he visited his grandmother's farm in Atlantic where he met Hallie Loomis. She was a slightly older girl from a wealthier family who became his first love. Years later, he wrote an autobiographical tale called Morning, Winter and Night about their relationship. The story contained disturbing themes including rape, incest, and sadomasochism set on the farm. He published this work under the pseudonym John Nairne Michealson to avoid offending his family.

• 2. Journalistic Firings And Pacifist Views

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  Anderson worked at the night copy desk of the Grand Forks Herald while attending college. He graduated from the University of North Dakota in 1911 with a Bachelor of Arts degree. Later he served as principal of a high school in Minnewaukan, North Dakota. In 1913, he lost that job after making pacifist statements to his students. He then attended Stanford University, earning a Master's degree in English Literature by 1914. Anderson taught English in San Francisco before becoming chairman of the department at Whittier College in 1917. He was fired from that position after one year for supporting Arthur Camp. Camp was a jailed student seeking status as a conscientious objector during World War I. He moved to Palo Alto to write for the San Francisco Evening Bulletin but was dismissed again. This firing occurred because he wrote an editorial claiming Germany could not pay its war debt. He subsequently joined the San Francisco Chronicle but was fired after contracting Spanish flu and missing work. Alvin S. Johnson hired him to write about politics for The New Republic in 1918. An argument with Editor-in-Chief Herbert David Croly led to his second dismissal from that role.

• 3. Blank Verse And Dramatic Success

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  Anderson founded The Measure: A Journal of Poetry in 1921 as a magazine devoted to verse. He wrote White Desert, his first play, in 1923 which ran only twelve performances. Laurence Stallings reviewed it favorably in the New York World and later collaborated on What Price Glory. That production opened successfully in New York City in 1924. Anderson resigned from the World newspaper immediately afterward to launch his career as a dramatist. His plays utilized widely varying styles including extensive use of blank verse. Some works were adapted into films while others remained stage productions. He wrote screenplays for other authors' novels such as All Quiet on the Western Front in 1930. Death Takes a Holiday followed in 1934 as another screenplay adaptation. His first Broadway hit arrived with the 1924 World War I comedy-drama What Price Glory. The play used profanity which caused censors to protest its content. Chief censor Rear Admiral Charles Peshall Plunkett was discredited after writing obscene letters to General Chamberlaine. Anderson won the Pulitzer Prize in 1933 for Both Your Houses, a political drama. He received two New York Drama Critics Circle Awards for Winterset and High Tor.

• 4. Tudor Era Historical Dramas

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  Anderson enjoyed great commercial success with plays set during the Tudor family reign. This dynasty ruled England, Wales, and Ireland from 1485 until 1603. Elizabeth the Queen opened in 1930 featuring Lynn Fontanne as Elizabeth and Alfred Lunt as Lord Essex. It was later adapted into the film The Private Lives of Elizabeth and Essex starring Bette Davis and Errol Flynn. Mary of Scotland premiered in 1936 with Katharine Hepburn playing Mary, Queen of Scots. Fredric March portrayed the Earl of Bothwell while Florence Eldridge played Elizabeth. The original play had been a hit on Broadway with Helen Hayes in the title role. Anne of the Thousand Days became a stage hit in 1948 but did not reach movie screens for twenty-one years. Rex Harrison and Joyce Redman starred in the Broadway production. Richard Burton and Geneviève Bujold appeared in the 1969 film version. His play The Wingless Victory was written in verse and premiered in 1936 with Katharine Cornell. Tad Mosel documented this era in Leading Lady: The World and Theatre of Katharine Cornell published by Little, Brown & Co.

• 5. Musical Theater Collaborations

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  Anderson wrote book and lyrics for two successful musicals with composer Kurt Weill. Knickerbocker Holiday focused on early Dutch settlers of New York. Walter Huston played Peter Stuyvesant in the production. The show's standout number September Song became a popular standard. So did the title song from Lost in the Stars, a story based on Alan Paton's novel Cry, The Beloved Country. In 1950, Anderson and Weill began collaborating on a musical adaptation of Mark Twain's Huckleberry Finn. Weill died before completing only a few songs for that project. Saturday's Children ran as a long-running comedy-drama about married life starting in 1927. Humphrey Bogart made an early appearance in its original run. The play was filmed three times including a part-talkie version in 1929. A B-film called Maybe It's Love appeared in 1935 in almost unrecognizable form. John Garfield starred in the 1940 revival under its original title. Television adaptations condensed the story into versions released in 1950, 1952, and 1962.

• 6. Marriages And Personal Tragedy

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  Anderson married Margaret Haskett, a classmate, on the 1st of August 1911, in Bottineau, North Dakota. They had three sons named Quentin, Alan, and Terence. In 1929 he wrote Gypsy, a prophetic play about a vain liar who kills herself by inhaling gas. Around this time, Anderson began a relationship with Gertrude Higger, later known as Mab Maynard. She was a married actress whose husband was singer Charles V. Maynard. The affair led Anderson to split with Haskett who died in 1931 following a car accident and stroke. Mab divorced her husband and moved in with Anderson. Their daughter Hesper was born in August 1934. Anderson left Maynard after discovering her affair with TV producer Jerry Stagg. Losing him, facing massive tax debt, and losing their home proved too much for Mab. On the 21st of March 1953, she killed herself by breathing car exhaust after several attempts. Hesper later wrote South Mountain Road: A Daughter's Journey of Discovery describing how she found out her parents never married. Anderson then married Gilda Hazard on the 6th of June 1954. This marriage lasted until his death in 1959.

• 7. Final Years And Death

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  Anderson identified himself as an atheist throughout his life. He died in Stamford, Connecticut, on the 28th of February 1959, two days after suffering a stroke. He was seventy years old at the time of his passing. His body was cremated and half his ashes were scattered by the sea near his home in Stamford. The other half was buried in Anderson Cemetery near his birthplace in rural northwestern Pennsylvania. An inscription on his tombstone reads Children of dust astray among the stars. Half of his papers and personal effects are housed at the Harry Ransom Center at the University of Texas at Austin. This archive contains over sixty boxes including manuscripts, letters, diaries, financial papers, and family photographs. Smaller collections exist at institutions like the Chester Fritz Library and the New York Public Library for the Performing Arts. The archive was placed at the Ransom Center in 1961 by Anderson's widow, Mrs. Gilda Hazard Anderson.