Barnes, Djuna

Barnes, Djuna (Linda Steptoe, pen name)

(1892–1982) writer, poet; born in Cornwall-on-Hudson, N.Y. She studied at Pratt Institute and the Art Students League, N.Y., illustrated, and wrote short stories, poetry, and plays. She became an expatriate in Paris (1920–40), then returned to New York City where she lived as a virtual recluse (1940–82). Her best known work is Nightwood (1936), a modernist novel praised by T. S. Eliot.

The Cambridge Dictionary of American Biography, by John S. Bowman. Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1995. Reproduced with permission.