Thomas McLernon Greene (May 17, 1926 – June 23, 2003) was an American scholar of English literature. A native of

Haddonfield, New Jersey Haddonfield is a borough (New Jersey), borough located in Camden County, New Jersey, Camden County, in the U.S. state of New Jersey. As of the 2020 United States census, the borough's population was 12,550, an increase of 957 (+8.3%) from the ...

, Greene was born on May 17, 1926. He completed his undergraduate degree at

Yale University Yale University is a Private university, private Ivy League research university in New Haven, Connecticut, United States. Founded in 1701, Yale is the List of Colonial Colleges, third-oldest institution of higher education in the United Stat ...

in 1949, after serving in the

Counterintelligence Corps The Counter Intelligence Corps (Army CIC) was a World War II and early Cold War intelligence agency within the United States Army consisting of highly trained special agents. Its role was taken over by the U.S. Army Intelligence Corps in 1961 and ...

. from 1945 to 1947. Between 1949 and 1951, Greene attended the

University of Paris The University of Paris (), known Metonymy, metonymically as the Sorbonne (), was the leading university in Paris, France, from 1150 to 1970, except for 1793–1806 during the French Revolution. Emerging around 1150 as a corporation associated wit ...

. He became an instructor at Yale in 1954, a year before completing his doctorate in comparative literature, also at Yale. Greene was named a full professor in 1966 and appointed the Frederick Clifford Ford Professor of English and Comparative Literature in 1978, serving until retirement in 1996. He continued to research and write until his death on June 23, 2003, in

New Haven, Connecticut New Haven is a city of the U.S. state of Connecticut. It is located on New Haven Harbor on the northern shore of Long Island Sound. With a population of 135,081 as determined by the 2020 United States census, 2020 U.S. census, New Haven is List ...

. Yale held a public memorial service for Greene on September 5, 2003. His wife Liliane Massarano Greene died in 2010. Greene has authored numerous books including ''The Light in Troy'' which won the Modern Language Association's

James Russell Lowell Prize The James Russell Lowell Prize is an annual prize given to an outstanding scholarly book by the Modern Language Association. Background The prize is presented for a book that is an outstanding literary or linguistic study, a critical edition of ...

and the American Comparative Literature Association's Harry Levin Prize in 1982.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Greene, Thomas McLernon 1926 births 2003 deaths American literary critics Yale University alumni Yale University faculty People from New Haven, Connecticut People from Haddonfield, New Jersey University of Paris alumni American expatriates in France