Ernest Vincent Wright
Ernest Vincent Wright (March 26, 1871 – October 6, 1939) was an American writer best known for his 1939 novel Gadsby, a 50,000-word lipogrammatic work which avoids the letter "E" (except for four unintentional instances).
Biography
Wright was born in Boston, Massachusetts, to Henry Estes Wright, a veteran of the Civil War, and Clara Adelaide Wright. According to the 1900 Census, he had been working as a dancing instructor. Then, according to the Census ten years later, he was a salesman in the typewriting industry. In July 1917, Wright was enlisted and drafted to work for the navy, before being discharged in 1919/1921.
During the 1920's, he had worked as a musician. Eventually, he worked as a newspaper reporter and editor before turning to fiction. However his work was largely ignored by critics and publishers during his lifetime.
In 1936, Wright completed a draft of Gadsby during a nearly six-month stay at the National Military Home in California. Unable to secure a publisher, he self-published the novel.<ref>Bookride, February 24, 2007</ref> Copies of Gadsby became extremely rare, with some selling for thousands of dollars.
Wright previously authored several other works, including The Wonderful Fairies of the Sun (1896), The Fairies That Run the World and How They Do It (1903), and Thoughts and Reveries of an American Bluejacket (1918). His humorous poem, "When Father Carves the Duck," appears in some anthologies.<ref>Brotherhood of Railroad Trainmen, The Railroad Trainman, Volume 23, p. 991</ref>
Works
- The Wonderful Fairies of the Sun (1896)
- The Fairies That Run the World and How They Do It (1903)
- Thoughts and Reveries of an American Bluejacket (1918)
- Gadsby (1939)
- "When Father Carves the Duck" (poem)