William Abrahams (author)

William Abrahams (1919 - 1998) was an American poet, author, and editor. His literary career spanned a wide array of disciplines including poetry, novels, biographies, non-fiction books, and editing short stories and novels. He presided over the O Henry Awards for best short stories from 1965 to 1996; awarding the best short story in the nation as well as editing and curating the yearly anthology of O Henry nominated short stories. In his role with the awards, Robert McG. Thomas Jr. lauded Abrahams as "almost single-handidly preserving the short story as a viable genre."^[1]

Abrahams began his career writing poetry.^[2] He wrote four novels including Interval in Carolina (1945), By the Beautiful Sea (1947), and Imperial Waltz (1954).^[1] Interval in Carolina tells the story of an American soldier stationed at the homefront during World War 2 who finds love. The premise of the novel may have been from Abrahams' own experiences as a soldier during World War 2 serving as military police in Miami, Florida.^[1]

He served as an editor of books starting in 1963. He was an editor for the Atlantic Monthly Press.^[3][1] He also had his own imprint (William Abrahams Books) for Dutton and Holt, Rinehart & Winston.^[1] Throghout his career, Abrahams edited over 350 books, including novels by authors Joyce Carol Oates, John Fowles, John Knowles, Shirley Hazzard and Pauline Kael.^[1][3][4] In 1968, he moved to Northern California to become the West-Coast editor for the Atlantic Monthly Press.^[1] In 1968, he began a creative partnership with historian Peter Stansky and the collaboration produced 4 non-fiction books. This included Journey to the Frontier: Two Roads to the Spanish Civil War (1966) which was a finalist for the National Book Award.^[5] Stansky and Abrahams also authored a two volume biography of George Orwell, The Unknown Orwell (1972) and Orwell: The Transformation (1980), with both books being finalists for the National Book Award in the biography category.^[5] The fourth book, London's Burning: Life, Death and Art in the Second World War (1994), documented different artists in wartime Britain and explained how the war shaped their works. Artists featured in the book were: Paul Nash, Graham Sutherland, Henry Moore, Humphrey Jennings, and Benjamin Britten.^[6]

Abrahams grew up in Boston, Massachusetts graduated from Harvard University. He also studied writing at Stanford University.^[1][4]