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Robert Myron Coates (1897–1973) was an American writer and an art critic for the New Yorker
The New Yorker

The New Yorker is an United States magazine that publishes reportage, commentary, criticism, essays, fiction, satire, cartoons, and poetry. Starting as a weekly in the mid-1920s, the magazine is now published 47 times per year, with five of these issues covering two-week spans....
. He coined the term, "Abstract Expressionism
Abstract expressionism

Abstract expressionism was an American post?World War II art movement. It was the first specifically American movement to achieve worldwide influence and also the one that put New York City at the center of the art world, a role formerly filled by Paris....
" in 1946 in reference to the works of Arshile Gorky
Arshile Gorky

Arshile Gorky , was an Armenians-born United States painter who had a seminal influence on Abstract Expressionism....
, Jackson Pollock
Jackson Pollock

Paul Jackson Pollock was an influential American painter and a major force in the abstract expressionism movement. In October 1945, he married the artist Lee Krasner....
 and Willem de Kooning
Willem de Kooning

Willem de Kooning was an abstract expressionist artist, born in Rotterdam, the Netherlands.In the post-World War II era, de Kooning painted in a style that came to be referred to variously as Abstract expressionism, Action painting, and the New York School....
. As a writer of fiction, he is considered a member of the Lost Generation
Lost Generation

The 'Lost Generation' is a phrase made popular by American author Ernest Hemingway in his first published novel The Sun Also Rises. Often it is used to refer to a group of United States literary notables who lived in Paris and other parts of Europe, some after military service in the World War I....
, spending part of his life abroad in Europe. His first three novels are highly experimental, drawing upon Dada
Dada

Dada or Dadaism is a cultural movement that began in Z?rich, Switzerland, during World War I and peaked from 1916 to 1922. The movement primarily involved visual arts, literature?poetry, art manifestoes, aesthetics?theatre, and graphic design, and concentrated its anti-war politics through a rejection of the prevailing standards in art...
, surrealism
Surrealism

Surrealism is a cultural movement that began in the early-1920s, and is best known for the visual artworks and writings of the group members....
 and expressionism
Expressionism

Expressionism is the tendency of an artist to distort reality for an emotional effect; it is a subjective art form. Expressionism is exhibited in many art forms, including painting, literature, theatre, film, Expressionist architecture and Expressionism ....
 for their effect. His last two novels are examples of crime fiction
Crime fiction

Crime fiction is the genre of fiction that deals with crimes, their detection, criminals and their Motive s. It is usually distinguished from mainstream fiction and other genres such as science fiction or historical fiction, but boundaries can be, and indeed are, blurred....
 in which the narrator presents a psychopathological case study of the protagonist.

Nowadays, Coates is best known for The Outlaw Years (1930), which deals with the history of the land pirates of the Natchez Trace
Natchez Trace

The Natchez Trace, a 440-mile-long path extending from Natchez, Mississippi to Nashville, Tennessee, linked the Cumberland River, Tennessee River and Mississippi River rivers....
.






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Encyclopedia


Robert Myron Coates (1897–1973) was an American writer and an art critic for the New Yorker
The New Yorker

The New Yorker is an United States magazine that publishes reportage, commentary, criticism, essays, fiction, satire, cartoons, and poetry. Starting as a weekly in the mid-1920s, the magazine is now published 47 times per year, with five of these issues covering two-week spans....
. He coined the term, "Abstract Expressionism
Abstract expressionism

Abstract expressionism was an American post?World War II art movement. It was the first specifically American movement to achieve worldwide influence and also the one that put New York City at the center of the art world, a role formerly filled by Paris....
" in 1946 in reference to the works of Arshile Gorky
Arshile Gorky

Arshile Gorky , was an Armenians-born United States painter who had a seminal influence on Abstract Expressionism....
, Jackson Pollock
Jackson Pollock

Paul Jackson Pollock was an influential American painter and a major force in the abstract expressionism movement. In October 1945, he married the artist Lee Krasner....
 and Willem de Kooning
Willem de Kooning

Willem de Kooning was an abstract expressionist artist, born in Rotterdam, the Netherlands.In the post-World War II era, de Kooning painted in a style that came to be referred to variously as Abstract expressionism, Action painting, and the New York School....
. As a writer of fiction, he is considered a member of the Lost Generation
Lost Generation

The 'Lost Generation' is a phrase made popular by American author Ernest Hemingway in his first published novel The Sun Also Rises. Often it is used to refer to a group of United States literary notables who lived in Paris and other parts of Europe, some after military service in the World War I....
, spending part of his life abroad in Europe. His first three novels are highly experimental, drawing upon Dada
Dada

Dada or Dadaism is a cultural movement that began in Z?rich, Switzerland, during World War I and peaked from 1916 to 1922. The movement primarily involved visual arts, literature?poetry, art manifestoes, aesthetics?theatre, and graphic design, and concentrated its anti-war politics through a rejection of the prevailing standards in art...
, surrealism
Surrealism

Surrealism is a cultural movement that began in the early-1920s, and is best known for the visual artworks and writings of the group members....
 and expressionism
Expressionism

Expressionism is the tendency of an artist to distort reality for an emotional effect; it is a subjective art form. Expressionism is exhibited in many art forms, including painting, literature, theatre, film, Expressionist architecture and Expressionism ....
 for their effect. His last two novels are examples of crime fiction
Crime fiction

Crime fiction is the genre of fiction that deals with crimes, their detection, criminals and their Motive s. It is usually distinguished from mainstream fiction and other genres such as science fiction or historical fiction, but boundaries can be, and indeed are, blurred....
 in which the narrator presents a psychopathological case study of the protagonist.

Nowadays, Coates is best known for The Outlaw Years (1930), which deals with the history of the land pirates of the Natchez Trace
Natchez Trace

The Natchez Trace, a 440-mile-long path extending from Natchez, Mississippi to Nashville, Tennessee, linked the Cumberland River, Tennessee River and Mississippi River rivers....
. It is the only work by the author that is still in print. He was survived by his second wife, Astrid Peters Coates (1910-1995), his son, Anthony (from his marriage to Elsa Kirpal, which had ended in divorce); and his stepdaughter, Ingrid Waldron.

Novels

The Eater of Darkness (1926)
Yesterday's Burdens (1933)
The Bitter Season (1946)
Wisteria Cottage (1948)
The Farther Shore (1955)

Short story collections

All The Year Round (1943)
The Hour After Westerly (1957)
The Man Just Ahead Of You (1965)

Non-fiction

The Outlaw Years (1930)
The View From Here (1960)
Beyond the Alps (1961)
South of Rome (1965)

Contributions to The New Yorker
The New Yorker

The New Yorker is an United States magazine that publishes reportage, commentary, criticism, essays, fiction, satire, cartoons, and poetry. Starting as a weekly in the mid-1920s, the magazine is now published 47 times per year, with five of these issues covering two-week spans....

Title Department Volume/Part Date Page(s) Subject(s)
The law Fiction 23/41 29 November 1947 41-43 
Rembrandt and Juan Gris The Art Galleries 25/49 28 January 1950 60, 62 Rembrandt at the Wildenstein Gallery; Gris at the Buchholz Gallery


Further reading

Pierce, Constance. "Gertrude Stein and her Thoroughly Modern Protege." Modern Fiction Studies 42.3 (Autumn 1996): 607-25.
---. "Language • Silence • Laughter: The Silent Film and the 'Eccentric' Modernist Writer." SubStance 16.1 (1987): 59-75.
Roza, Mathilde. "Following Strangers: The Life and Literary Career of Robert Myron Coates (1897-1973)." U. of Nijmegen Diss., 2005.