William Herrick (

Trenton, NJ Trenton is the List of capitals in the United States, capital city of the U.S. state of New Jersey and the county seat of Mercer County, New Jersey, Mercer County. It was the federal capital, capital of the United States from November 1 until D ...

, January 10, 1915 – Old Chatham, NY, January 31, 2004) was an American novelist, sometimes referred to as "an American

Orwell Eric Arthur Blair (25 June 1903 – 21 January 1950) was an English novelist, poet, essayist, journalist, and critic who wrote under the pen name of George Orwell. His work is characterised by lucid prose, social criticism, opposition to a ...

Biography

Herrick was born to Jewish parents who had come to the United States from

Belarus Belarus, officially the Republic of Belarus, is a landlocked country in Eastern Europe. It is bordered by Russia to the east and northeast, Ukraine to the south, Poland to the west, and Lithuania and Latvia to the northwest. Belarus spans an a ...

and settled in

Trenton, New Jersey Trenton is the List of capitals in the United States, capital city of the U.S. state of New Jersey and the county seat of Mercer County, New Jersey, Mercer County. It was the federal capital, capital of the United States from November 1 until D ...

. Herrick was among the

Abraham Lincoln Brigade The XV International Brigade was one of the International Brigades formed to fight for the Spanish Republic during the Spanish Civil War. History The XVth Brigade mustered at Albacete in January 1937. It consisted of English-speaking volunte ...

which fought

Franco Franco may refer to: Name * Franco (name) * Francisco Franco (1892–1975), Spanish general and dictator of Spain from 1939 to 1975 * Franco Luambo (1938–1989), Congolese musician, the "Grand Maître" * Franco of Cologne (mid to late 13th cent ...

's forces during the

Spanish Civil War The Spanish Civil War () was a military conflict fought from 1936 to 1939 between the Republican faction (Spanish Civil War), Republicans and the Nationalist faction (Spanish Civil War), Nationalists. Republicans were loyal to the Left-wing p ...

. Drawing on that experience he wrote ''Hermanos!'' (1969), a novel about the war itself, and another novel set in

Spain Spain, or the Kingdom of Spain, is a country in Southern Europe, Southern and Western Europe with territories in North Africa. Featuring the Punta de Tarifa, southernmost point of continental Europe, it is the largest country in Southern Eur ...

, ''Shadows and Wolves'' (1980), about the post-Franco period. He left the American Communist Party over the Hitler–Stalin non-aggression pact in 1939 and criticised the Brigade as willing accomplices of the Communist secret police, who were killing off anyone who criticized the Party. This is reflected in the plot of "Hermanos!" whose American Communist protagonist comes to Spain in order to fight Fascism, but gets diverted into hunting down members of the dissident radical left

POUM The Workers' Party of Marxist Unification (, POUM; , POUM) was a Spanish communist party formed during the Second Spanish Republic, Second Republic and mainly active around the Spanish Civil War. It was formed by the fusion of the Trotskyism, Tro ...

- eventually breaking away from the party and rejoining the last desperate fight of the Republic up to the fall of Barcelona. Two other novels touch on his experience in Spain: ''Love and Terror'' (1981) and ''Kill Memory'' (1983). His autobiography is entitled ''Jumping the Line: The Adventures and Misadventures of an American Radical'' (1998).

Personal life

Herrick was married to artist Jeanette Herrick. Herrick was friends and had a long correspondence with

Thomas Berger Thomas Louis Berger (July 20, 1924 – July 13, 2014) was an American novelist. Probably best known for his picaresque novel ''Little Big Man'' and the subsequent film by Arthur Penn, Berger explored and manipulated many genres of fiction throu ...

Bibliography

Fiction

*''The Itinerant'' (1967) *''Hermanos!'' (1969) *''The Last to Die'' (1971) *''Strayhorn'' (1973) *''Golcz: A Novel'' (1976) *''Shadows and Wolves'' (1980) *''Love and Terror'' (1981) *''Kill Memory'' (1984) *''That's Life: A Fiction'' (1985) *''Bradovich'' (1993)

Nonfiction

*''Jumping the Line: The Adventures and Misadventures of an American Radical'' (1998) - Autobiography

References

External links

Brief biography of William Herrick
at the

New York State Writers Institute The New York State Writers Institute is a literary organization based at the University at Albany in Albany, New York. It sponsors the Albany Book Festival, the Albany Film Festival, Visiting Writers Series, Classic Film Series, the Trolley onli ...

website. {{DEFAULTSORT:Herrick, William 1915 births 2004 deaths Writers from Trenton, New Jersey American male novelists American autobiographers 20th-century American novelists American people of Belarusian-Jewish descent Abraham Lincoln Brigade members Novelists from New Jersey 20th-century American non-fiction writers American male non-fiction writers 20th-century American male writers