George Davis (editor)

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George Davis (1906 – 1964?) was an influential American fiction editor and minor novelist. After an early period in Chicago, Davis spent much of his twenties as an expatriate in Paris. His only novel, the Opening of a Door, was published to critical praise in 1931. He served as fiction editor of the periodical Harper's Bazaar from the years 1936 to 1941. After being being fired from Harper's, he served as an editor for Mademoiselle for eight years. A flamboyant alcoholic and overweight homosexual, he is noted for attempting to bring serious literature to the generally light world of woman's magazines. He was an early sponsor of such diverse literary figures as Truman Capote, Ray Bradbury and Jane Bowles. Davis and several friends, including Gypsy Rose Lee, founded an art commune at 7 Middagh Street in Brooklyn Heights in October of 1940. Dubbed February House by Anaïs Nin because so many of its residents had February birthdays, the house became a hub of cultural activities in New York. Figures like Benjamin Britten, W.H. Auden and Carson McCullers were live-in guests. A study of 7 Middagh Street, entitled February House, was published in 2005.

[edit] In Literature

A very unflattering literary duplicate of George Davis was written by Truman Capote in the form of the character "Boaty" in his unfinished work Answered Prayers.^[1]

[edit] References

Clarke, Gerald. Capote: A Biography. Carroll & Graf, 2005.

Tippins, Sherill. February House: The Story of W. H. Auden, Carson McCullers, Jane and Paul Bowles, Benjamin Britten, and Gypsy Rose Lee, Under One Roof In Wartime America. Houghton Mifflin, 2005.