Edgar Fawcett

Edgar Fawcett (May 26, 1847 - May 2, 1904) was an American novelist and poet. Fawcett was born in New York City on May 26, 1847 and spent much of his life there. Educated at Columbia College, he obtained the A.B. there in 1867 and his M.A. three years later. At Columbia, he was a member of the Fraternity of Delta Phi and the Philolexian Society. Although successful in his time, his works are mostly forgotten today. His best known novels, such as Purple and Fine Linen (1873) and New York (1898), were satirical studies of New York high society. Fawcett also wrote a parody of the King Arthur legends entitled The New King Arthur: An Opera Without Music (1885), as well as numerous works for children, such as Short Poems for Short People (1872). In 1877, his poem "Box" appeared in the Sacramento Daily Union having been reprinted from The Atlantic, where it would appear in the September issue. His volumes of verse included Song and Story (1884) and Songs of Doubt and Dream (1891). His verse was frequently anthologized. Fawcett's rather remarkable novels Solarion (about a dog given human intelligence) and Douglas Duane (1885) (on scientific body-switching), as well as The Ghost of Guy Thryle (1895) (which has astral projection as a means of interplanetary travel) deserve to be better known. "The Man from Mars" was published in the June 1892 issue of Short Stories: A Magazine of Select Fiction. Stanley R. Harrison's study, entitled Edgar Fawcett, was published in 1972. It lists many unpublished manuscripts sent in for copyright with such titles as "The Man from Mars" and "The Destruction of the Moon," but no trace of most of these beyond the listing seems to exist. Fawcett spent many of the last years of his life in London, where he died on May 2, 1904.