Christopher Benfey

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Christopher Benfey
Christopher Benfey
Born	28 October 1954 -
Occupation	Professor
Nationality	United States
Subjects	Emily Dickinson
Notable work(s)	Degas in New Orleans: Encounters in the Creole World of Kate Chopin and George Washington

Christopher Benfey (born 28 October 1954) is an American literary critic and Emily Dickinson scholar. He is the Mellon Professor of English at Mount Holyoke College. ^[1]

Contents 1 Background 2 Career 3 Select publications 4 Notes 5 External links

[edit] Background

Benfey was born in Merion, Pennsylvania but spent most of his childhood in Richmond, Indiana and attended The Putney School. He began his undergraduate studies at Earlham College, where his father was a professor in the Chemistry department, and completed his B.A. at Guilford College. Benfey holds a Ph.D. from Harvard University.

[edit] Career

Benfey is a specialist in 19th and 20th century American literature. He is also an established essayist and critic who has been published in The New York Times Sunday Book Review, The New Republic, The New York Review of Books, and The Times Literary Supplement.

[edit] Select publications

• The Great Wave: Gilded Age Misfits, Japanese Eccentrics, and the Opening of Old Japan, (2003). [1]
• Degas in New Orleans: Encounters in the Creole World of Kate Chopin and George Washington, (1999).

[edit] Notes

[edit] External links

• Official website - Mount Holyoke College
• Christopher Benfey in the New York Review of Books