Frederick Exley
Frederick Exley (1929-1992) was an American author known for his unique contributions to the genre of fictional memoirs. Born in Watertown, New York, he earned a B.A. in English from the University of Southern California after a brief stint at Hobart College. Though he experienced a rather uneventful career, Exley's most notable work, "A Fan's Notes," published in 1968, garnered critical acclaim and achieved cult status, drawing comparisons to J.D. Salinger's "The Catcher in the Rye." This book, which explores themes of alcoholism, failed relationships, and personal struggles, was nominated for the National Book Award and won several literary honors, including the William Faulkner Award.
Exley's later works, "Pages from a Cold Island" (1975) and "Last Notes from Home" (1988), followed a similar introspective style but did not receive the same level of recognition. Throughout his writing, Exley displayed a stark self-honesty and a critique of American culture's aspirations and excesses. He often contrasted himself with figures like football star Frank Gifford and literary critic Edmund Wilson, using these comparisons to reflect on his own life. Celebrated for his eloquent prose, Exley is regarded as a "writer's writer," appreciated particularly among literary circles for his candid exploration of the human experience.
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Subject Terms
Frederick Exley
Writer
- Born: March 28, 1929
- Birthplace: Watertown, New York
- Died: June 17, 1992
- Place of death: Alexandria Bay, New York
Biography
Frederick Exley was born in Watertown, New York, on March 28, 1929, and died June 17, 1992, in Alexandria Bay, New York. After a brief stay at Hobart College, he received his B.A. in English from the University of Southern California in 1953. He was married and divorced twice, and had a daughter from each brief marriage. His career was remarkably uneventful, but it produced a trilogy of fictional memoirs. A Fan’s Notes, although it sold fewer than ten thousand copies, received critical acclaim when it was published in 1968 and became a kind of cult classic, not unlike J. D. Salinger’s The Catcher in the Rye had a decade earlier. This fictional memoir was nominated for the prestigious National Book Award, won the William Faulkner Award for the best novel of 1968, and received the National Institute of Arts and Letters Rosenthal Award. Exley was also the recipient of a Rockefeller Foundation grant, and the Harper-Saxton and John Guggenheim fellowships.
Exley’s two later books, Pages from a Cold Island (1975) and Last Notes from Home (1988), while they followed the winning formula of A Fan’s Notes, never lived up to their promise. In all three works, Exley memorializes his dissipated life, and writes about his alcoholism, his failed marriages, his periods of hospitalization, attempted suicides, and other self-destructive behavior. In each work he also finds a hero against which to pit himself: Frank Gifford (the New York Giants football star from the 1950’s and 60’s) in A Fan’s Notes; the literary critic Edmund Wilson in Pages from a Cold Island, and his dying brother William in Last Notes from Home. Exley writes with an eloquent style (critics compared him to F. Scott Fitzgerald), and reveals himself with abrasive self-honesty and little self-pity. In the end, his books also add up to a powerful critique of the hopes and excesses of American culture. Finally, his work contains a preoccupation with writing itself, which may explain why Exley has always been considered, at least by American critics, a writer’s writer.