Madison Smartt Bell (born August 1, 1957, Nashville, Tennessee) is an American novelist. While established as a writer by several early novels, he is especially known for his trilogy of novels about Toussaint Louverture and the Haitian Revolution, published 1995–2004.

Early life and education

Raised in Nashville, Bell is a graduate of Princeton University, where he won the Ward Mathis Prize and the Francis LeMoyne Page award, and Hollins University, where he won the Andrew James Purdy fiction award. He later lived in New York City and London before settling in Baltimore, Maryland.

Career

Bell is a Professor of English at Goucher College in Towson, Maryland, where he was Director of the Creative Writing Program from 1998 to 2004. He taught in various creative writing programs, including the Iowa Writers' Workshop, the Poetry Center of the 92nd Street Y, and the Johns Hopkins Writing Seminars. In addition, he has written essays and reviews for Harper's, The New York Review of Books, and the New York Times Book Review. His papers are held at Princeton University and at East Carolina University. The latter contains papers related to novels and other writing early in his career, up to 1990.

Personal life

Bell is married to poet Elizabeth Spires, who also teaches at Goucher College. They have a daughter, Celia Dovell Bell.

Awards

Works

Fiction

Biography

Other nonfiction