US author E.L. Doctorow dead at 84
July 22, 2015
The award-winning author died on Tuesday in New York from complications from lung cancer. He was 84.
Critics described Edgar Lawrence Doctorow's books as ones that re-imagined America's past, applying its lessons to the present and future.
Notable works were set in the run up to the American Civil War, World War One and the Great Depression.
He was best known for his turn of the 20th century novel "Ragtime." Published in 1975, it was later made into a film, featuring James Cagney, and a Broadway musical.
Other works included "Billy Bathgate", set in 1930s New York, which also became a movie and "The March," chronicling General William Sherman's brutal advance through the South in the US civil war.
US President Barack Obama described Doctorow as "one of America's greatest novelists."
His editor at Random House, Kate Medina, paid her own tribute: "Through books of great beauty and power, and characters I'll never forget, he showed us America's great flaws and its astonishing promise, and our own."
As well as a dozen novels, Doctorow wrote short stories, a stage play and numerous articles and essays.
He was awarded the National Book Award, the National Book Critics Circle Awards and two PEN Faulkner Awards, among other honors.
Born in New York in 1931, Doctorow was named after American writer Edgar Allen Poe.
He is survived by his wife, son, two daughters and four grandchildren.
mm/msh (AFP, Reuters)