EDUCATION

Privately educated, due to childhood illness, until age eight, then in English preparatory and public schools, subsequently in U.S., in Balboa High School, then Canterbury School and Portsmouth Priory School, graduating in 1943. Entered Yale 1944, read Philosophy; after military service, studied Composition and Theory at the Manhattan School, Japanese at Columbia University; completed B.A. at the U. of Iowa (Writer's Workshop), 1949-50, and M.A. (French Literature) at Yale, 1951. Studied law at Holborn College of Law and Gray's Inn (London) and comparative law at U. of Strasbourg (external).

PUBLICATIONS

Consult standard bibliographies, periodical indices and -- for newspaper articles -- the databases (amongst others) of the Sunday Times (London), the Independent, La Stampa. About half of his books have been published under his own name; his principal, but not only, pseudonym, is I.I. Magdalen. His two most recent books, both published by the Toby Press, are: Out of Nowhere (a collection of the novellas "O Brother!" and "Olga and Snow" and two stories, "Along the River Plate" and "Francoise") and Editors: The Best of Five Decades, a huge, 1100-page anthology of the best texts printed in the magazines he and Mr. Bellow have published over the last five decades. Reviews are posted. In the Spring of 2002, the Toby Press brought out two more books: a novel, The Mothers, and a crime novel by I. I. Magdalen called Lennie & Vance and Benji, followed by Emma H. His next two novels nearing completion are Death and the Maiden, the third and concluding novel of the "Mount Trilogy" (O Brother! and The Mothers), and Collaboration, a novel on the last days of the Vichy regime.

He is currently working (together with the London therapist, Dr. Barrington S. Cooper, and the Parisian analyst, Marika Moissëeff) on 'The Sadness of Women,' a psycho-historical study of Tristesse.

He is also working on a collective biography of the non-communist Left between 1930 and 1968, including Victor Serge, Czeslaw Milosz. George Orwell, Konstantin Jelensky, Ignazio Silone, Spender, Manes Sperber, Nicola Chiaromnte, Melvin Lasky, Francois Bondy and thirty-odd others, and a book on the history of the Mediterranean.

CAREER

His career has been divided into a number of professions: writing, teaching, editing, music, administration, and the law being the more consistent. For Writing, see publications. For teaching: Yale, Quinnipiac College, U. of Iowa, Bard College, U. of Puerto Rico, U. of Texas, and Boston University, where he is currently Professor of Journalism and Lecturer in History (Italian and Mediterranean); for editing, see Yale Poetry Review, Poetry New York, Kolokol, Delos, The Noble Savage, ANON, The Republic of Letters (the last three with Saul Bellow), Bostonia. He is a contributing editor to Stand and Leviathan; for music, his works include two song-cyles and a number of chamber works; in administration, he was Director of the Ford Foundation's National Translation Center, and later Deputy International Secretary of P.E.N.; in law, he has served primarily as a consultant in international sports law. He has also served as Asst. to the President at the University of Puerto Rico and at Boston University, and as Asst. Producer at the Stratford (Conn.) Shakespeare Festival, at MGM, and at CBS/TV.

FAMILY

Keith Botsford was born in Brussels, Belgium, of March 29, 1928. His father (1898-1947) was Willard Hudson Botsford, son of Charles Botsford (d.1937) and Florence Topping. The family, originally from Lichfield in Leicestershire, settled in Connecticut in the 1630s, and married into several Hudson River Valley families, notably the Tappans (Topping). His mother (1897-1994) was born Carolina Elena Rangoni-Machiavelli-Publicola-Santacroce, 2nd. daughter of the Marchesa Alda Rangoni. His only brother, Richard Henry John Thomas van der Zee, b. 1921, died in 1991. He has nine children:

(Issue of Ann Angela Hilton Winchester)

• Aubrey Nicholas van der Zee, b. 1957, New York, editor at the International Maritime Organization in London, m. Christine Billings of Baltimore, issue: 2s. (August, Theodore), 1d. (Matilda)
• Clarissa Michael Tarleton, b. 1959, San Juan, Puerto Rico, Lecturer in English, Rome, m. Fabrizio Barca, issue: 1d. (Valentina), 2s. (Benjamin, Niccolò)
• Giannandrea Tappan, b. 1960, Venice, architect, issue (of Anahi Coppponex): 1s. (Cy), 1d. (Luna)
• Josue Pedro-Celestinho Hull, b. 1962, Rio de Janeiro, co-owner of 'Sparrow's' restaurant in Denver, CO, m. Jennifer Sparrow, issue: 1d. (Anabel), 1 s. (Luke)
• Flora Fidelia Rangoni, b. 1964, Mexico DF, currently Press Information Officer for Oxfam

(Issue of S. E. Weekes)

• Maj. Mathew Willard Luis Wyk, b. 1968, Austin, Texas, Queen's Royal Dragoons, m. Maria Pender-Cudlipp, issue: 4s (Frederick, George, Samuel, Archibald)
• Polly Alda Elwina Donges, b. 1972, London, solicitor

(Issue of Nathalie Favre-Gilly)

• Thomas Cato Paul Gaudenzio, b. 1987, Rome
• Xenia Swift Publicola, b. 1987, Rome (dec.)