Amos Wilder

Amos Niven Wilder (September 18, 1895 – May 1, 1993) was an American poet, minister, and theology professor.

Life

Wilder was born in Madison, Wisconsin. He studied for two years at Oberlin College (1913–1915), but volunteered in the Ambulance Field Service; he was awarded the Croix de Guerre.{{Cite web |url=http://www.novelguide.com/a/discover/ewb_16/ewb_16_06866.html |title=Amos Niven Wilder |access-date=June 11, 2009 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20100116004724/http://www.novelguide.com/a/discover/ewb_16/ewb_16_06866.html |archive-date=January 16, 2010 |url-status=dead }} In November 1917, he enlisted in the U.S. Field Artillery as a corporal. He wrote Battle Retrospect, about his experiences in World War I.

In 1920, Wilder graduated from Yale University. In college he was an inter-collegiate doubles champion tennis player, and he played at Wimbledon in 1922, with his partner Lee Wiley.{{Cite book | url=https://books.google.com/books?id=Pzy9Zs99nzoC&pg=PP27 | title=Armageddon Revisited: A World War I Journal| date=April 27, 1994| isbn=0300174322}} He served as secretary to Albert Schweitzer lecturing at Oxford University,{{cite book| url=https://archive.org/details/lettersofgertrud00stei | url-access=registration | title=The letters of Gertrude Stein and Thornton Wilder | page=[https://archive.org/details/lettersofgertrud00stei/page/90 90]| publisher=Yale University Press| year=1996| isbn=978-0-300-06774-3 }}{{cite news| url=https://www.nytimes.com/1993/05/04/obituaries/amos-n-wilder-a-bible-scholar-literary-critic-and-educator-97.html| title=Amos N. Wilder, a Bible Scholar, Literary Critic and Educator, 97| author=Wolgan Saxon| date=May 4, 1993| work=The New York Times }} where he was studying at Mansfield College (1921–1923). He completed his studies for ordained ministry at Yale in 1924.

Ministry

Wilder was ordained in 1926 and served in a Congregational church in North Conway, New Hampshire. He received his doctorate from Yale in 1933.{{cite book|last=McKnight|first=Edgar V.|title=Dictionary of major biblical interpreters|year=2007|publisher=IVP Academic|location=Downers Grove, Ill.|isbn=9780830829279|pages=1052–1056|edition=2nd|editor=Donald K. McKim|chapter=Wilder, Amos Nevin}} He taught for 11 years at the Chicago Theological Seminary and the University of Chicago, and served as president of the Chicago Society of Biblical Research in 1949–1950. Wilder joined Harvard University in 1954 as Hollis Professor of Divinity. In 1962 he was part of the first board of directors for the Society for the Arts, Religion and Contemporary Culture. In 1963, he was named emeritus faculty. His papers are held at the Harvard Divinity School Library of Harvard Divinity School.{{cite web|title=Wilder, Amos N. (Amos Niven), 1895-1993. Papers, 1923-1982: A Finding Aid.|url=http://nrs.harvard.edu/urn-3:DIV.LIB:div00641|website=Harvard Library Online Archival Search System|publisher=Harvard Divinity School Library|accessdate=28 June 2014}}

Family

Wilder's father, Amos Parker Wilder, was a journalist with a doctorate from Yale, who served as United States Consul General in Hong Kong and Shanghai between 1906 and 1914. His mother was the daughter of a Presbyterian minister. His brother was Thornton Wilder, and sisters were Charlotte Wilder, Isabel Wilder and Janet Wilder Dakin.

Wilder married Catharine Kerlin in 1935. They had a daughter, Catharine Wilder Guiles, and a son, Amos Tappan Wilder.

Awards

Golden Rose Award
1923 Yale Series of Younger Poets, Battle Retrospect

Works

=Poetry=

{{cite book| title=Arachne: poems | publisher=Yale University Press| year=1928 }}
{{cite book| title=Battle-Retrospect and Other Poems| publisher=Yale University Press| year=1923 }} reprint 1971 by AMS Press.

=Memoir=

{{cite book| title=Armageddon Revisited| url=https://books.google.com/books?id=Pzy9Zs99nzoC | publisher=Yale University Press| year=1994| isbn=978-0-300-05560-3}}

=Theology=

{{cite book| title=The spiritual aspects of the new poetry| publisher=Harper & Brothers| year=1940 }}
{{cite book| title=Eschatology and ethics in the teaching of Jesus| publisher=Harper| year=1950 }}
{{cite book| title=Liberal learning and religion| others=National Council on Religion in Higher Education | publisher=Harper| year=1951 }}
{{cite book| title=Otherworldliness and the New Testament| publisher=Harper| year=1954 }}
{{cite book| title=New Testament faith for today| publisher=Harper| year=1955 }}
{{cite book| title=Early Christian Rhetoric: The Language of the Gospel| publisher=Harper| year=1964 }}
{{cite book| title=Theology and Modern Literature| publisher=Harvard University Press| year=1967 }}
{{cite book| title=The new voice: religion, literature, hermeneutics| publisher=Herder and Herder| year=1969 }}
{{cite book| title=Theopoetic: Theology and the Religious Imagination| publisher=Fortress Press| year=1976 }}

=Non-fiction=

{{cite book| title=Thornton Wilder and his public| publisher=Fortress Press| year=1980| isbn=978-0-8006-0636-7| url-access=registration| url=https://archive.org/details/thorntonwilderhi0000wild}}

=Criticism=

{{cite book| title=A fragile craft: the work of Amos Niven Wilder| author=John Dominic Crossan| publisher=Scholars Press| year=1981 }}
{{cite book| title=The Poetics of Faith: Essays Offered to Amos Niven Wilder| author=William A. Beardslee| publisher=Society of Biblical Literature| year=1978 }}

References

External links

[http://nrs.harvard.edu/urn-3:DIV.LIB:div00641 Papers of Wilder are in the Harvard Divinity School Library] at Harvard Divinity School in Cambridge, Massachusetts

Category:1895 births

Category:1993 deaths

Category:Alumni of Mansfield College, Oxford

Category:American expatriates in the United Kingdom

Category:American male tennis players

Category:United States Army personnel of World War I

Category:American theologians

Category:American World War I poets

Category:20th-century American male writers

Category:American male poets

Category:Harvard Divinity School faculty

Category:Oberlin College alumni