Henry Seidel Canby was an influential American literary critic, editor, and academic who played a pivotal role in shaping mid-twentieth-century American literary tastes. Born in Wilmington, Delaware, to a prominent Quaker family, Canby attended the Wilmington Friends School before graduating from Yale University in 1899. He remained at Yale as an educator, teaching English and eventually achieving the rank of professor in 1922.
Canby's editorial career began to flourish when he took charge of the literary review of the New York Evening Post. In 1924, he co-founded the Saturday Review of Literature, serving as its editor until 1936. Through this publication, Canby wielded significant cultural influence; notably, his 1933 commentary on the sociologist Vilfredo Pareto helped spark a widespread intellectual vogue for Pareto's ideas during the 1930s.
In 1926, Canby assumed the role of Editorial Chair for the newly established Book of the Month Club. In this position, he became a key proponent of "middlebrow" culture, aiming to make high-quality literature accessible to a broader subscription audience. Much of his editorial work for both the Saturday Review and the Book of the Month Club was conducted from his office at Yelping Hill, a summer colony in Cornwall, Connecticut, which he co-founded with his wife, Marion Ponsonby Gause Canby, and several academic and literary associates. Canby reflected on this productive environment and his career in his book American Memoir.
