Arthur Walton Litz, Jr. (October 31, 1929, in Nashville, Tennessee – June 4, 2014) was an American literary historian and critic who served as professor of English Literature at

Princeton University Princeton University is a private research university in Princeton, New Jersey. Founded in 1746 in Elizabeth as the College of New Jersey, Princeton is the fourth-oldest institution of higher education in the United States and one of the ...

from 1956 to 1993. He was the author or editor of over twenty collections of literary criticism, including various editions of Ezra Pound,

James Joyce James Augustine Aloysius Joyce (2 February 1882 – 13 January 1941) was an Irish novelist, poet, and literary critic. He contributed to the modernist avant-garde movement and is regarded as one of the most influential and important writers of ...

Wallace Stevens Wallace Stevens (October 2, 1879 – August 2, 1955) was an American modernist poet. He was born in Reading, Pennsylvania, educated at Harvard and then New York Law School, and spent most of his life working as an executive for an insurance compa ...

, and T. S. Eliot. Litz graduated with an A.B. in English from

in 1951 after completing a senior thesis titled " Yoknapatawpha: A Study of

William Faulkner William Cuthbert Faulkner (; September 25, 1897 – July 6, 1962) was an American writer known for his novels and short stories set in the fictional Yoknapatawpha County, based on Lafayette County, Mississippi, where Faulkner spent most o ...

's Moral Vision." He then studied at Merton College,

University of Oxford , mottoeng = The Lord is my light , established = , endowment = £6.1 billion (including colleges) (2019) , budget = £2.145 billion (2019–20) , chancellor ...

as a Rhodes Scholar and received his

D.Phil. A Doctor of Philosophy (PhD, Ph.D., or DPhil; Latin: or ') is the most common degree at the highest academic level awarded following a course of study. PhDs are awarded for programs across the whole breadth of academic fields. Because it is ...

in 1954. He studied alongside and at one point lived with cultural theorist Stuart Hall, who described him as 'extraordinarily smart'. After two years' service in the

U.S. Army The United States Army (USA) is the land service branch of the United States Armed Forces. It is one of the eight U.S. uniformed services, and is designated as the Army of the United States in the U.S. Constitution.Article II, section 2, cl ...

, he became the Holmes Professor of Belles-Lettres at Princeton in 1956, where he worked until his retirement in 1994. Litz was also a longtime instructor at the

Bread Loaf School of English Middlebury College is a private liberal arts college in Middlebury, Vermont. Founded in 1800 by Congregationalists, Middlebury was the first operating college or university in Vermont. The college currently enrolls 2,858 undergraduates from all 5 ...

. He was named to the Eastman Visiting Professorship at Balliol College, Oxford in 1989. In 1991, he was elected to the

American Philosophical Society The American Philosophical Society (APS), founded in 1743 in Philadelphia, is a scholarly organization that promotes knowledge in the sciences and humanities through research, professional meetings, publications, library resources, and communit ...

. Litz married Marian Weller in 1958; they had four children. He died of respiratory failure on June 4, 2014, aged 84, at University Medical Center of Princeton in Plainsboro, New Jersey. He is survived by his four children and six grandchildren.

References

External links

List of A. Walton Litz's academic papers at Princeton University Library; includes a photograph and brief career overview (dated 2003)''Yoknapatawpha: A Study of William Faulkner's Moral Vision''—Princeton University 1951 senior thesis by Arthur Walton Litz, Jr.June 2006 newsletter from Balliol College, Oxford, listing A. Walton Litz among the former George Eastman Professors at the College
1929 births American Rhodes Scholars Princeton University faculty Princeton University alumni Alumni of Merton College, Oxford American literary critics 20th-century American historians American male non-fiction writers 2014 deaths 20th-century American male writers Members of the American Philosophical Society {{US-historian-stub