HOW WE SEE IT: Donald Douglas Harington

Posted: November 12, 2009 at 4:13 a.m.

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SPRINGDALE — “Every writer writes, one of them once said, in expectation of love.” - Donald Harington What does one write about Donald Harington that holds up in comparison to anything he wrote?

The best tribute to any writer would be to put him in print again. We thought of using an extended excerpt from one of his books as today’s editorial. His publisher, Toby Press, generously and unhesitatingly agreed. They even recommended an excellent passagefrom his lightly-disguised autobiographical novel, “Let Us Build a City.”

The more we looked, though, the less we were inclined to rip a page from where it belongs - in its book. Perhaps we will later for thesake of those who have never read him, but not today. Not yet.

We recommend the books. We recommend them whole and would have recommended them at any point in Harington’s life, not just in retrospect. The author was a novelist, distinguished professor emeritus of art, and an alumnus of the University of Arkansas. He died at midnight Saturday at age 73 after a long battle with cancer.

Lauded for his novels, Harington taught art history at the University of Arkansas, starting as a visiting assistant professor in 1986, gaining tenure in 1991 and retiring in 2008.

His first published novel, “The Cherry Pit,” was published by Random House in 1965. It was runner-up for the William Faulkner Foundation Award for best first novel.

His next novel, “Lightning Bug,” was the first set in the mythical Ozark village of Stay More. Harington dedicated the book to his friend and mentor William Styron, the Pulitzer-Prize winner best known for his novels “Sophie’s Choice” and “The Confessions of Nat Turner.” Styron provided Harington the use of his summer house while Harington was writing “The Cherry Pit.” They remained good friends until Styron’s death in 2006.

Harington’s masterpiece is widely considered to be “The Architecture of the Arkansas Ozarks,” written in 1975. The American Library Association listed the books as one of the 10 best novels of the year.

Harington’s awards include: The Porter Prize for Literary Excellence in 1987, the Robert Penn Warren Award for Fiction in 2003 and the Oxford American Lifetime Award for Contributions to Southern Literature in 2006. In 1995, he was included in the Dictionary of Literary Biography as one of fewer than two dozen American writers culled from the post-World War II era. His name stood alongside such writers as Flannery O’Connor, James Agee, Sylvia Plath, Gore Vidal and Tom Wolfe. The next year, he was named to the Arkansas Writers Hall of Fame.

He will be remembered most by many as a teacher, and an excellent one. He taught a variety of art history and survey courses about American and European art at the university.

“Don was a masterful teacher who inspired his students with his insights into art, his wonderful use of language and his incredible wit,” said Lynn Jacobs, chair of the art department. “He never let disabilities get in the way of conveying the joys of art history to his students.” Harington had lost much of his hearing.

Harington earned a Master of Arts in art history at Boston University. He pursued doctoral studies at Harvard, but left in 1960 to start teaching at Bennett College in Millbrook, N.Y. He later became a professor at Windham College in Putney, Vt., where he was chairman of the art department. He left Windham in 1978 and served as a visiting professor at several universities - South Dakota State University, the University of Pittsburgh and the University of Missouri-Rolla - before returning to Arkansas.

His last book, “Enduring,” was issued in September.

Opinion, Pages 5 on 11/12/2009

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