Samuel Lynn Hynes (August 29, 1924 – October 9, 2019) was an American author. He won a Robert F. Kennedy Book Award for The Soldiers' Tale in 1998.

Biography

Hynes was born in Chicago, Illinois. He attended the University of Minnesota and Columbia University.[1]

Hynes served as a Marine Corps pilot from 1943 until 1946 and in 1952 and 1953. In a memoir, "Flights of Passage," Hynes explored in detail his pilot training and subsequent service in the Pacific during World War II. [2] He received the Distinguished Flying Cross.[1] He also discussed his experiences as a pilot in the documentary series The War by Ken Burns (2007).[3] Burns interviewed Hynes again for The Vietnam War (2017), where Hynes discussed his experiences at Northwestern University during its anti-Vietnam War protests.

Hynes was a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature and Woodrow Wilson Professor of Literature emeritus at Princeton University. His other books include On War and Writing (University of Chicago Press, 2018), A War Imagined,[4] The Growing Seasons[1] and The Unsubstantial Air: American Fliers in the First World War published by Farrar, Straus and Giroux in October 2014.[5]

Family

Alex Preston (born 1979), British author and journalist, and his brother Samuel Preston (1982) lead singer of English band The Ordinary Boys, are among his grandsons.[6][7]

Death

Hynes died of congestive heart failure at the age of 95 in his home in Princeton, New Jersey, on October 9, 2019.[8]

References

  1. ^ a b c "Samuel Hynes". Bloomsbury. Retrieved 21 November 2013.
  2. ^ Hynes, Samuel (1988). Flights of Passage. US Naval Inst. 1988.
  3. ^ Sam Hynes
  4. ^ Hynes, Samuel Lynn (1991). A war imagined: the First World War and English culture. Atheneum. ISBN 978-0-689-12128-9.
  5. ^ "Five Under-The-Radar Reads From Librarian Nancy Pearl," NPR, December 19, 2014.
  6. ^ Carole Cadwalladr (19 July 2009). "Interview with Preston, former singer with the Ordinary Boys and now launching a solo career". The Observer. UK. Retrieved 22 October 2011.
  7. ^ "Fifteen minutes with Samuel Preston, singer_guitarist_songwriter with The Ordinary Boys and fan of Morrissey". Julie Hamill. February 20, 2013. Retrieved 7 June 2014.
  8. ^ "Samuel Hynes, Professor Whose Books Taught Lessons of War, Dies at 95". The New York Times. 18 October 2019.
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