Alcohol and the Writer

228 Pages·2016·11.47 MB·English

by  Donald W. Goodwin

ALCOHOL
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WRITER
“SHOWS US A GOOD DEAL ABOUT AMERICAN WRITERS, AND SOMETHING
ABOUT AMERICAN DRINKERS, TOO."—THE NEW YORK TIMES
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Digitized by the Internet Archive
in 2018 with funding from
Substance Abuse Librarians and Information Specialists (SALIS)
https://archive.org/details/alcoholwriterOOgood
PENGUIN BOOKS
ALCOHOL AND THE WRITER
Donald W. Goodwin, M.D., is professor and chairman of the
Department of Psychiatry at the University of Kansas Medical
Center and is an international authority on alcoholism. He is the
author of numerous articles on alcoholism and the recently
published book Is Alcoholism Hereditary? Other works by Dr.
Goodwin include Anxiety; Psychiatric Diagnosis, coauthored with
S.B. Guze; Phobia: The Facts; Longitudinal Research in Alcoholism,
coauthored with K. T. VanDusen and S. A. Mednick; Alcoholism:
The Facts; and Alcoholism and Affective Disorders, coedited with
Carlton Erickson.
Medicine was Dr. Goodwin's second career choice. After
receiving an undergraduate degree in English, Goodwin served
two years in the Army as a psychiatric social worker. Goodwin
then spent four years as an editor and columnist for a national
newspaper syndicate in New York where he studied writing
under the tutelage of Lionel Trilling and W. H. Auden. At the age
of twenty-nine, he was admitted to medical school.
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ALCOHOL
AND THE
WRITER
Donald W. Goodwin, M.D.
PENGUIN BOOKS
PENGUIN BOOKS
Published by the Penguin Group
Viking Penguin, a division of Penguin Books USA Inc.,
40 West 23rd Street, New York, New York 10010, U.S.A.
Penguin Books Ltd, 27 Wrights Lane, London W8 5TZ, England
Penguin Books Australia Ltd, Ringwood, Victoria, Australia
Penguin Books Canada Ltd, 2801 John Street,
Markham, Ontario, Canada L3R 1B4
Penguin Books (N.Z.) Ltd, 182-190 Wairau Road,
Auckland 10, New Zealand
Penguin Books Ltd, Registered Offices:
Harmondsworth, Middlesex, England
First published in the United States of America by
Andrews and McMeel, a Universal Press Syndicate Company, 1988
Published in Penguin Books 1990
10 987654321
Copyright © Donald W. Goodwin, M.D., 1988
All rights reserved
LIBRARY OF CONGRESS CATALOGING IN PUBLICATION DATA
Goodwin, Donald W.
Alcohol and the writer/Donald W. Goodwin,
p. cm.
Includes bibliographical references.
ISBN 014 01.2655 4
1. Authors, American—Alcohol use. 2. Creative writing—
Psychological aspects. 3. Authorship)—Psychological aspects.
4. Drinking customs—United States. 5. Authors, American—
Psychology. 6. Authors, American—Biography. 7. Alcoholism—
United States. 8. Authors—Alcohol use. I. Title.
[PS129.G66 1990]
810.9'353—dc20 89-36512
Printed in the United States of America
Except in the United States of America, this
book is sold subject to the condition that it
shall not, by way of trade or otherwise, be lent,
re-sold, hired out, or otherwise circulated
without the publisher’s prior consent in any form
of binding or cover other than that in which it
is published and without a similar condition
including this condition being imposed on the
subsequent purchaser.
To Sarah
(both of them),
William and Mary
and Caitlin

Contents
Preface,ix
Acknowledgments, xi
Introduction, 1
.
1
Poe / Chairman of the Board, 9
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2
Fitzgerald / "I'm F. Scott Fitzgerald, the Well-Known Alcoholic," 36
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3
Hemingway / Scenes from New York and Havana, 50
.
4
Steinbeck / The Dog That Didn't Bark, 73
.
5
Simenon / Learning to Drink American-Style, 93
.
6
Faulkner / The Count No'Count Who Went to Stockholm, 100
7.
O'Neill / Alcohol and the Irish, 123
.
8
Lowry / Canadian Paradise, 138
.
9
Notes on an Epidemic, 172
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