F. O. Matthiessen

F. O. Matthiessen
Matthiessen (right) with Russell Cheney, Normandy, Summer 1925
Born	Francis Otto Matthiessen (1902-02-19)February 19, 1902 Pasadena, California, US
Died	April 1, 1950(1950-04-01) (aged 48) Boston, Massachusetts, US
Resting place	Springfield Cemetery, Springfield, Massachusetts
Alma mater	Yale, Oxford and Harvard
Occupation(s)	Historian, literary critic, educator
Known for	American Renaissance
Partner	Russell Cheney
Awards	DeForest and Alpheus Henry Snow Prizes, Rhodes Scholarship

Francis Otto Matthiessen (February 19, 1902 – April 1, 1950) was an educator, scholar and literary critic influential in the fields of American literature and American studies.^[1] His best known work, American Renaissance: Art and Expression in the Age of Emerson and Whitman, celebrated the achievements of several 19th-century American authors and had a profound impact on a generation of scholars. It also established American Renaissance as the common term to refer to American literature of the mid-nineteenth century. Matthiessen was known for his support of liberal causes and progressive politics. His contributions to the Harvard University community have been memorialized in several ways, including an endowed visiting professorship.