John Berendt (born December 5, 1939) is an American author, known for writing the best-selling non-fiction book Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil , which was a finalist for the 1995 Pulitzer Prize in General Nonfiction.

Early life [ edit ]

Berendt grew up in Syracuse, New York , where both of his parents were writers. ^[1] As an English major at Harvard University , he worked on the staff of the Harvard Lampoon . He graduated in 1961 and moved to New York City to pursue a journalism career. ^[2]

Career [ edit ]

Berendt was an associate editor of Esquire from 1961 to 1969, editor of New York magazine from 1977 to 1979, and a columnist for Esquire from 1982 to 1994. ^[2] Despite interviewing Jim Williams , the central character in Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil , in 1982, it was not until 1985 that Berendt moved to Savannah, Georgia , ^[3] to begin researching a new book, which was seven years in the making. ^[4] (The killing of Danny Hansford , which is the book's central story, happened the year preceding Berendt's first visit, while Williams had been convicted of murder for a second time at the point of his return.) ^[5] His initial plan was to spend three weeks at a time in Savannah, then return to New York City to write, but he changed his mind. "Things would happen if i was simply there," he said in 1997. "It made sense to stay, so I got a full-time apartment in Savannah." He lived, briefly, in a carriage house on East Charlton Lane, ^{[4] [6]} behind 22 East Jones Street . ^[7]

External videos
Booknotes interview with Berendt on Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil , August 28, 1997 , C-SPAN

He published Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil in 1994, and it became an overnight success. The book spent a record-breaking 216 weeks on the New York Times bestseller list ^[8] ? still, to this day, the longest-standing best seller of the Times .

The story, unsettling and real, broke down the idea of the quintessential phenomenon of a true American city?only to reveal its quirks: its man walking an invisible dog; its voice of the drag queen; a high-society man in its elite community?all that somehow, unravels a murder mystery. Virtually seeming like a novel and reading like a tale, the non-fictional story is about the real-life events surrounding the murder trial of Jim Williams. ^[9] Berendt acknowledged that he fabricated some scenes and changed the sequence of some events. ^[10] The book was adapted into a 1997 film directed by Clint Eastwood . John Cusack plays John Kelso, a character loosely based on Berendt.

Berendt's second book, The City of Falling Angels , was published in September 2005. ^[11] It chronicles interwoven lives in Venice in the aftermath of the fire that destroyed the La Fenice opera house. According to Kirkus Reviews , "Berendt does great justice to an exalted city that has rightly fascinated the likes of Henry James , Robert Browning , and many filmmakers throughout the world." ^[12]

In 2024, aged 84, he returned to Savannah, for his first speaking engagement in sixteen years, to sign copies of a 30th-anniversary edition of Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil . ^[13]

References [ edit ]

Further reading [ edit ]

Archival resources [ edit ]

• Esquire, Inc. Records 1933?1977 (26 linear feet) are housed at the Bentley Library at the University of Michigan . Contains correspondence with John Berendt.
• Larry McMurtry Collection, 1960?1976 (2.52 linear feet) is housed at the Harry Ransom Humanities Research Center of the University of Texas at Austin . Contains correspondence with John Berendt.

External links [ edit ]

• Appearances on C-SPAN