biography
| name: |
Henry, O
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pseudonym of William Sydney Porter, also as Oliver Henry, S H Peters
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| sex:
| male
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| lived:
| (1862–1910)
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| biography:
| Writer, born in Greensboro, North Carolina, USA. He was schooled in Greensboro and worked in a chemist shop there (c.1877–82). He held a variety of other jobs, such as ranch worker (1882–4), book-keeper and draughtsman (1884–91), and bank clerk (1891–4) in Texas. He was a journalist and owner of a weekly newspaper, Rolling Stone in Austin, TX, but in 1896 he fled to Honduras to escape charges that he had embezzled money from the bank where he had worked. He returned when he learned his wife was seriously ill, and was convicted (1897) and imprisoned at Ohio State Penitentiary (1898–1901), where he began to write short stories. Upon his release he settled in New York City. Writing about little incidents in the lives of ordinary people, he became known for his sentimental stories with ironic endings, such as ‘The Gift of the Magi’ and ‘The Furnished Room’. Originally published in magazines, his stories were regularly collected in a series of highly successful volumes (1904–17). |
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