William March facts for kids

Quick facts for kids William March
William March, c. 1933
Born	(1893-09-18)September 18, 1893 Mobile, Alabama
Died	May 15, 1954(1954-05-15) (aged 60) New Orleans, Louisiana
Occupation	Novelist Short-story writer U.S marine
Genre	Psychological realism
Literary movement	The Lost Generation

William March (born September 18, 1893 – died May 15, 1954) was an American writer known for his stories about how people think and feel. He was also a brave and highly honored U.S. Marine. March wrote six novels and four collections of short stories. Even though critics praised his work, he never became very famous during his lifetime.

March grew up in a poor family in rural Alabama. He couldn't finish high school and didn't get his high school diploma until he was 20. He later tried to study law but again couldn't afford to finish. In 1917, while working in New York, he joined the U.S. Marine Corps. He fought in World War I and received some of the highest military awards. These included the French Croix de Guerre, the American Distinguished Service Cross, and the U.S. Navy Cross.

After the war, March worked in a law office again before starting a very successful business career. While working in business, he began writing. He started with short stories and then, in 1933, published a novel called Company K. This book was based on his experiences in the war. He then wrote the "Pearl County" series, which included novels and short stories set in his home state of Alabama. The most popular book from this series was The Looking-Glass.

March's last novel, The Bad Seed, was published in 1954, the same year he died. This book became a huge bestseller, but March never saw it turned into a play or a movie. On June 8, 2015, William March was one of the first twelve writers to be honored in the Alabama Writers Hall of Fame.

William March's Early Life and Education

William March was born William Edward Campbell. His father worked as a "timber cruiser," which meant he estimated which groups of trees were big enough for lumber companies to cut down. William was the oldest of eleven children, though two died when they were babies. He grew up in and around Mobile, Alabama. His father enjoyed reciting poetry, especially from Edgar Allan Poe, at dinner. His mother, whose maiden name was Susan March, was likely better educated and taught the children to read and write.

Neither parent seemed to support young March's writing efforts. He later said he wrote a very long poem when he was 12 but burned it. With eight other brothers and sisters, March didn't have special advantages. When he was 14, his family moved to Lockhart, Alabama, which stopped him from going to high school. (Lockhart later became the imaginary Hodgetown in March's novels Come in at the Door and The Tallons.) Instead, March got some schooling, probably in one-room schools common in sawmill towns back then. He found a job in a lumber mill office.

Two years later, March returned to Mobile and worked in a local law office. By 1913, he had saved enough money to take a high school course at Valparaiso University in Indiana. This allowed him to enroll at the University of Alabama to study law. He was a good student but couldn't afford to finish his law degree. In the fall of 1916, he moved to New York. There, he lived in a small boarding house in Brooklyn, worked as a clerk in a law firm, and enjoyed going to plays.

William March's Military Service in World War I

Military Awards, c. 1918

On June 5, 1917, March signed up for military service, just over a month after the U.S. joined World War I. He volunteered for the U.S. Marines on July 25. After finishing his training on Parris Island, he was sent to France in February 1918. March traveled on the USS Von Steuben from Philadelphia. He arrived in France in March 1918 and served as a sergeant in the 5th Marines, part of the U.S. Army Expeditionary Force.

March's company fought in every major battle involving American troops, and they suffered many losses. March first saw action near Verdun and then at Belleau Wood. There, he was wounded in the head and shoulder. He returned to the front lines in time for the attacks at Soissons and Saint-Mihiel. March was promoted twice and reached the rank of sergeant. He was then assigned to French troops in the Blanc Mont area for "statistical duties."

During the attack on Blanc Mont, which began on October 3, March "left a shelter to rescue wounded soldiers." The next day, during an enemy counterattack, he "immediately entered the engagement and though wounded refused to be evacuated until the Germans were thrown back." Because of his brave actions, March received the French Croix de Guerre with Palm and the Army Distinguished Service Cross. The Distinguished Service Cross is the second highest Army award, just below the Medal of Honor.

March often mixed real events with imagined memories. For example, he told people he was badly gassed in the war and didn't have long to live, even though he wasn't hospitalized for it. Many characters in his novel Company K suffer and die from mustard gas attacks. March also often told a story about jumping into a bomb crater for shelter and coming face to face with a young German soldier, whom he immediately attacked. This story also appeared in Company K.

March's Life After World War I and His Writing Career

In 1919, March returned to civilian life but struggled with feelings of worry and sadness. He rarely spoke about his own war experiences or awards. However, people noticed he always carried his medals with him, and sometimes he would tell war stories.

March stayed with his family in Tuscaloosa, Alabama for a few weeks. Then he found work at a law firm in Mobile. Soon, he became the personal secretary to John B. Waterman, who owned a new and fast-growing shipping company. March eventually became the company's vice-president. By 1924, he was promoted to traffic manager. In 1926, the company opened an office in Memphis, Tennessee, which March oversaw. He spent two years in Memphis and became involved in local theater.

During this time, he traveled a lot for business, often with his friend J.P. Case. Case remembered that March's rooms were always full of papers and books, many about psychology. March was reading a lot about the human mind. In 1928, March moved to New York. There, he took creative writing classes at Columbia University and started writing short stories.

March chose his pen name, William March, after one of his stories, "The Holly Wreath," was published under that name in The Forum magazine in September 1929. Other magazines also published his stories. His short stories were included in important yearly collections like The Best American Short Stories and the O. Henry Prize Stories in 1930, 1931, and 1932. In total, he published about twenty stories.

March finished his first novel, Company K, while living in New York. It was published in January 1933 and was an instant success. By this time, March was living in Hamburg, Germany. He was Waterman's senior traffic manager and was sent to Germany to help expand the company's business in Europe. In Hamburg, he finished his second novel, Come in at the Door. This was the first book in his "Pearl County" series, set in the made-up towns of Hodgetown, Baycity, and Reedyville.

While in Hamburg, March saw the rise of Adolf Hitler and the Nazi government. He wrote a short story called "Personal Letter" that predicted problems for Germany and the world. March was afraid to publish it at the time because he was known for being against war, and he worried about his German friends. It was later published in Trial Balance: The Collected Short Stories of William March.

Two years later, after moving to London, March finished his third novel, The Tallons, the second in his "Pearl County" series. Reviews in the UK were generally good, even better than in the United States. March's emotional problems, which had started in Germany, got worse in London. He became a patient of a psychoanalyst named Edward Glover. Glover helped March with a problem where he couldn't move his throat, explaining it was caused by stress. March dedicated The Tallons to Glover.

In London, March met many literary people and left more of his business work to others. In 1937, he returned to the U.S. Within two years, he quit his job to focus full-time on writing. He had been paid partly in company stock and could live comfortably from the money he received from it. In 1943, he completed his most important and praised novel, The Looking-Glass. This was the final book in his "Pearl County" series. A literature professor named Bert Hitchcock called it March's "finest literary achievement."

William March's Later Years and Final Works

In 1945, a collection of March's short stories, Trial Balance: The Collected Short Stories of William March, was published. Critics praised the stories for their "big ideas" and clever humor. One reviewer said March was "the dramatist of ideas" and managed to show "a variety of quiet desperation and low misery and high comedy."

Despite this praise, in 1947, after years of sadness from his war experiences and struggling to write, March had a nervous breakdown. He went back to Mobile, Alabama, to get better. He also made many trips to New York to sort out his personal matters. On one visit in 1949, March visited the art gallery of Klaus Perls. This meeting changed March's life. Perls, who was used to working with creative people, understood March in a way no one had since his therapy in London. Through Perls, March could openly talk about his writing ideas. Perls also introduced March to other artists. March felt a connection with the works of Pablo Picasso and Chaïm Soutine, as both March and Soutine showed similar ways of thinking. March bought many works by Soutine, Joseph Glasco, Picasso, and Georges Rouault. He continued visiting New York until 1953, when his health prevented him from traveling.

In late 1950, March left Mobile for good and bought a small house in the French Quarter of New Orleans. Here, he wrote his last two novels, October Island (1952) and The Bad Seed (1954). March thought The Bad Seed was not a great achievement. However, it became his most praised and successful novel, selling over a million copies in one year. It also led to a popular Broadway play and a movie in 1956.

William March's Death

On March 25, 1954, March had a mild heart attack. He was still recovering when The Bad Seed was published on April 8. He was able to read many of the good reviews for the book. He left the hospital on April 24. But just three weeks later, on the night of May 15, 1954, he died in his sleep from a second, more serious heart attack. He was 60 years old.

On the morning of March's death, a paragraph was found in his typewriter. It was titled "Poor Pilgrim, Poor Stranger" and was likely written after he left the hospital. It read:

The time comes in the life of each of us when we realize that death awaits us as it awaits others, that we will receive at the end neither preference nor exemption. It is then, in that disturbed moment, that we know life is an adventure with an ending, not a succession of bright days that go on forever. Sometimes the knowledge comes with the repudiation and quick revolt that such injustice awaits us, sometimes with fear that dries the mouth and closes the eyes for an instant, sometimes with servile weariness, an acquiescence more dreadful than fear. The knowledge that my own end was near came with pain, and afterwards astonishment, with the conventional heart attack, from which, I've been told, I've made an excellent recovery.

March is buried in Evergreen Cemetery in Tuscaloosa, Alabama, with his parents. His tombstone reads:

AUTHOR,

SOLDIER WORLD WAR I,

INDIVIDUALIST,

BELOVED CITIZEN OF ALABAMA.

William March's Literary Works

March's novels are like studies of people's minds. They connect his own personal struggles with problems caused by social class, family, and race. March's characters often become victims of bad luck, not because of their own mistakes. He wrote that people can only truly be free by being honest about who they are.

The British-American journalist Alistair Cooke said March was "the most underrated of all contemporary American writers of fiction." He called March's writing style "classic modern" and said March was "the unrecognized genius of our time." Cooke supported a collection of March's works called A William March Omnibus, which was published two years after March died. In 2009, only The Bad Seed and Company K were still being printed. In 2015, the University of Alabama Press reprinted the three novels in the Pearl County series: Come in at the Door, The Tallons, and The Looking-Glass.

Novels by William March

Company K

Company K, published in 1933, was praised by critics and writers. It is often compared to Erich Maria Remarque's famous anti-war novel All Quiet on the Western Front because of its sad view of war. A professor named Philip Beidler wrote that March's "act of writing Company K, in effect reliving his very painful memories, was itself an act of tremendous courage." Critics at the time praised March's unique way of telling the story from many different characters' points of view. In 2004, an Alabama filmmaker named Robert Clem made a movie based on the novel. The novel is also recognized as a World War I classic in other languages.

The Bad Seed

The Bad Seed, published in April 1954, quickly became a bestseller. Critics widely praised it for its suspense and horror. Although March lived long enough to see the positive reviews and hear about its success, he died before the novel's full impact was clear. It sold over a million copies. It was nominated for the 1955 National Book Award for Fiction. It was also turned into a successful Broadway play and adapted into a film three times: in 1956, in 1985, and in 2018.

William March's Short Stories

March was a talented short story writer and published four collections of stories. The Filipino poet and critic José García Villa called March "the greatest short story writer America has produced." March won four O. Henry Awards for his short stories, which was tied for the most wins by any author at that time. Trial Balance: The Collected Short Stories of William March collects many of March's short stories from his whole career. This book was published in 1987. None of March's story collections are currently being printed.

A small book with a March story, "The First Sunset," was printed in a limited edition of 150 copies by a Cincinnati printer and writer named Robert Lowry.

99 Fables

Six years after March's death, his 99 Fables were published. March's fables are like those of Aesop. A review in The New York Times Book Review said March "has picked up where Aesop and Don Marquis left off." However, another reviewer, Allen King, said the fables were "platitudinous" and didn't offer new ideas about people. The book's cover won an award in 1960. This book is not currently being printed.

Honors and Awards for William March

Military Awards

• French Croix de Guerre with Palm, 1918
• U.S. Distinguished Service Cross, 1918
• U.S. Navy Cross, 1918

Literary Awards

• "The Little Wife" included in The Best American Short Stories and O. Henry Prize Stories, 1930
• "Fifteen from Company K" included in O. Henry Prize Stories, 1931
• "A Sum in Addition" included in O. Henry Prize Stories, 1936
• "Maybe the Sun Will Shine" included in The Best American Short Stories, 1937
• "The Last Meeting" included in O. Henry Prize Stories, 1937
• "The Female of the Fruit Fly" included in The Best American Short Stories, 1944
• The Bad Seed, National Book Award nomination, 1955

Images for kids

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  Military Awards, c. 1918

See also

In Spanish: William March para niños