Peter De Vries Biography

American novelist, born in Chicago, educated at Northwestern University. He was an editor of Poetry and in 1944 joined The New Yorker. Connecticut and New York State form the background for many of the comic novels for which he became known, beginning with But Who Wakes the Bugler? (1940). The tales in No, but I Saw the Movie (1952) established him as a writer of verbal dexterity and exuberant imagination. His protagonists were God-fearing and vigorous but an underlying serious concern for religious and moral matters is evident in much of his work. Many of his novels evolved from stories previously published in The New Yorker. He parodied the style of writers such as Faulkner, Fitzgerald, and Hemingway with great success in The Tents of Wickedness (1959). Other works include Tunnel of Love (1954), Comfort Me with Apples (1956), The Mackerel Plaza (1958), Through the Fields of Clover (1961), Reuben, Reuben (1964), The Vale of Laughter (1967), The Prick of Noon (1985), Without a Stitch in Time (1972; short stories), Consenting Adults (1980), and Slouching towards Kalamazoo (1983).