William Merritt Sale Jr. (16 February 1899, Louisville, Kentucky — 7 January 1981, Ithaca, N. Y.) was a professor of English at

Cornell University Cornell University is a Private university, private Ivy League research university based in Ithaca, New York, United States. The university was co-founded by American philanthropist Ezra Cornell and historian and educator Andrew Dickson W ...

,"William M. Sale Jr., 81; An Authority on English." January 9, 1981.
''The New York Times''. Retrieved 19 December 2019. considered an authority on 18th-century

English literature English literature is literature written in the English language from the English-speaking world. The English language has developed over more than 1,400 years. The earliest forms of English, a set of Anglo-Frisian languages, Anglo-Frisian d ...

. After studying at Yale, where Chauncey Brewster Tinker directed his thesis, Sale went on to join the faculty at Cornell in 1936. Named Goldwin Smith Professor of English in 1959, he was named

professor emeritus ''Emeritus/Emerita'' () is an honorary title granted to someone who retirement, retires from a position of distinction, most commonly an academic faculty position, but is allowed to continue using the previous title, as in "professor emeritus". ...

upon retirement in 1968.Caputi, Anthony ''et al.'
"Cornell University Faculty Memorial Statement."
Cornell University. Retrieved 19 December 2019. From 1944 to 1960 Sale was the chief reader in English composition for the

College Entrance Examination Board The College Board, styled as CollegeBoard, is an American not-for-profit organization that was formed in December 1899 as the College Entrance Examination Board (CEEB) to expand access to higher education. While the College Board is not an asso ...

(CEEB). His students at Cornell included

Louis Auchincloss Louis Stanton Auchincloss (; September 27, 1917 – January 26, 2010)Holcomb B. Noble and Charles McGrath''The New York Times''. Retrieved on January 27, 2010. was an American lawyer, novelist, historian, and essayist. He is best known as a novel ...

Kurt Vonnegut Jr. Kurt Vonnegut ( ; November 11, 1922 – April 11, 2007) was an American author known for his satirical and darkly humorous novels. His published work includes fourteen novels, three short-story collections, five plays, and five nonfiction work ...

Harold Bloom Harold Bloom (July 11, 1930 – October 14, 2019) was an American literary critic and the Sterling Professor of humanities at Yale University. In 2017, Bloom was called "probably the most famous literary critic in the English-speaking world". Af ...

Whitney Balliett Whitney Lyon Balliett (April 17, 1926 – February 1, 2007) was a jazz critic and book reviewer for ''The New Yorker'' and was with the journal from 1954 until 2001. Biography Balliett was born in Manhattan and raised in Glen Cove, New Yor ...

, and

Helen Vendler Helen Vendler (née Hennessy; April 30, 1933 – April 23, 2024) was an American academic, writer and literary critic. She was a professor of English language and history at Boston University, Cornell, Harvard, and other universities. Her aca ...

. Sale had three sons: William M. 3d of St. Louis, Roger of Seattle and Kirkpatrick of New York.

Publications

* 1936: ''Samuel Richardson: A Bibliographical Record'' * 1950: ''Samuel Richardson, Master Printer'' * 1972: ''

Wuthering Heights ''Wuthering Heights'' is the only novel by the English author Emily Brontë, initially published in 1847 under her pen name "Ellis Bell". It concerns two families of the landed gentry living on the West Yorkshire moors, the Earnshaws and the ...

'' by

Emily Brontë Emily Jane Brontë (, commonly ; 30 July 1818 – 19 December 1848) was an English writer best known for her 1847 novel, ''Wuthering Heights''. She also co-authored a book of poetry with her sisters Charlotte Brontë, Charlotte and Anne Bront� ...

; William Sale (editor). New York: Norton Critical EditionsSteiner, Wendy
''The Sign in Music and Literature''
"Bibliography", p. 233. University of Texas Press, 2014. . At Google Books. Retrieved 19 December 2019.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Sale, William Cornell University faculty 1899 births 1981 deaths