Richard Hofstadter
| Richard Hofstadter | |
|---|---|
Hofstadter circa 1970
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| Born |
August 6, 1916 Buffalo, New York, United States |
| Died | October 24, 1970 (aged 54) New York, NY, United States |
| Nationality | American |
| Institutions | Columbia University |
| Alma mater |
University at Buffalo Columbia University |
| Doctoral advisor | Merle Curti |
| Known for | History of American political culture |
| Influences | Charles A. Beard, Merle Curti, Karl Marx, F. Scott Fitzgerald, H. L. Mencken, Karl Mannheim, Edmund Wilson, Vernon L. Parrington, Reinhold Niebuhr, Lionel Trilling, C. Wright Mills, Theodor Adorno, Seymour Martin Lipset |
| Influenced | Eric Foner, Robert Dallek, Christopher Hitchens, Susan Jacoby, David W. Noble, Mike Wallace, C. Vann Woodward, Arthur Schlesinger, Jr.; David M. Potter, Howard Zinn, Christopher Lasch |
| Spouse | Felice Swados (1936–45; her death) Beatrice Kevitt (widowed in 1970) |
| Children | Dan and Sarah |
Richard Hofstadter (6 August 1916 – 24 October 1970) was an American historian and public intellectual of the mid-20th century. Hofstadter was the DeWitt Clinton Professor of American History at Columbia University. Rejecting his earlier approach to history from the far left, in the 1950s he embraced consensus history, becoming the "iconic historian of postwar liberal consensus", largely because of his emphasis on ideas and political culture rather than the day-to-day doings of politicians. His influence is ongoing, as modern critics profess admiration for the grace of his writing, and the depth of his insight.
His most important works are Social Darwinism in American Thought, 1860–1915 (1944); The American Political Tradition (1948); The Age of Reform (1955); Anti-intellectualism in American Life (1963), and the essays collected in The Paranoid Style in American Politics (1964). He was twice awarded the Pulitzer Prize: in 1956 for The Age of Reform, an unsentimental analysis of the populism movement in the 1890s and the progressive movement of the early 20th century; and in 1964 for the cultural history Anti-intellectualism in American Life.
Richard Hofstadter was born in Buffalo, New York, in 1916, to a Jewish father, Emil A. Hofstadter and a German American Lutheran mother, Katherine (née Hill), who died when Richard was ten. He attended the Fosdick-Masten Park High School in Buffalo, graduating in the same class as entertainer Bob Smith. Hofstadter then studied philosophy and history at the University at Buffalo, from 1933, under the diplomatic historian Julius W. Pratt. Despite opposition from both families, he married Felice Swados in 1936 after he and Felice spent several summers at Hunter Colony, New York, run by Margaret Lefranc, their close friend for years; they had one child, Dan. Hofstadter was raised as an Episcopalian but later identified more with his Jewish roots. Antisemitism may have cost him fellowships at Columbia and attractive professorships.
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