Tony Horwitz

Anthony Lander Horwitz (June 9, 1958 – May 27, 2019) was an American journalist and author, widely known for his articles and books on subjects including American history and society. He won the 1995 Pulitzer Prize for National Reporting.

His books include ''One for the Road: a Hitchhiker's Outback'' (1987), ''Baghdad Without a Map'' (1991), '' Confederates in the Attic'' (1998), '' Blue Latitudes'' (AKA ''Into the Blue'') (2002), ''A Voyage Long and Strange: Rediscovering the New World'' (2008), ''Midnight Rising: John Brown and the Raid That Sparked the Civil War'' (2011), and ''Spying on the South: An Odyssey Across the American Divide'' (2019).

Early life and education

He was born in Washington, D.C., the son of Norman Harold Horwitz, a neurosurgeon, and Elinor Lander Horwitz, a writer. Horwitz was an alumnus of Sidwell Friends School, in Washington, D.C. He graduated Phi Beta Kappa as a history major from Brown University and received a master's degree at the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism.

Writing career

Horwitz won a 1994 James Aronson Award and the 1995 Pulitzer Prize for National Reporting for his stories about working conditions in low-wage America published in ''The Wall Street Journal''. He also worked as a staff writer for ''The New Yorker'' and as a foreign correspondent covering conflicts in Africa, Europe, and the Middle East.

He documented his venture into e-publishing and reaching best-seller status in that venue in an opinion article for ''The New York Times''.

In 2019 he began writing and lecturing for the Gertrude Polk Brown Lecture Series at The Filson Historical Society. His book ''Spying on the South: An Odyssey Across the American Divide'' focuses on the early ''New York Times'' journalist and correspondent Frederick Law Olmsted's travels through the American South from 1852 to 1857.

He was a fellow at the Radcliffe College Center of Advanced Study and a past president of the Society of American Historians. In 2020 it established the Tony Horwitz Prize honoring distinguished work in American history of wide appeal and enduring public significance.

Personal life

Horwitz married the Australian writer Geraldine Brooks in France in 1984. They had two children.

Death

On May 27, 2019, Horwitz collapsed while walking in Chevy Chase, Maryland. He was taken to George Washington University Hospital –the same hospital where he was born – and pronounced dead; the cause was cardiac arrest due to myocarditis. He was in the midst of a book tour for ''Spying on the South''.

Bibliography

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*Review
by David W. Blight.

References

External links

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Writer's Talk Interview

{{DEFAULTSORT:Horwitz, Tony
1958 births
2019 deaths
20th-century American Jews
20th-century American journalists
20th-century American male writers
20th-century American non-fiction writers
21st-century American Jews
21st-century American journalists
21st-century American male writers
21st-century American non-fiction writers
American foreign correspondents
American male journalists
American male non-fiction writers
Brown University alumni
Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism alumni
Jewish American journalists
Jewish American non-fiction writers
Journalists from Virginia
Journalists from Washington, D.C.
The New Yorker people
People from Waterford, Virginia
Pulitzer Prize for National Reporting winners
Sidwell Friends School alumni
The Wall Street Journal people