Cornell Woolrich

Woolrich worked between 1903 and 1968 across writer, novelist, screenwriter and crime fiction writer. The registers place that work in detective fiction. Every statement below returns to a source shown in the evidence panel; where the record is silent or divided, the article says so instead of resolving it.

• Name — Cornell Woolrich • Pen Name — William Irish, George Hopley • Birth Name — Cornell George Hopley Woolrich • Born — 4 December 1903 • Birthplace — New York City, US • Died — 25 September 1968 • Place of death — New York City, US • Education — Columbia University • Occupation — Writer (novelist) • Spouse — (d.1965)

Woolrich was born in New York City. His parents separated when he was young, and he lived for a time in Mexico with his father before returning to New York to live with his mother, Claire Attalie Woolrich. He attended Columbia University but left in 1926 without graduating when his first novel, Cover Charge, was published. As Eddie Duggan observes, "Woolrich enrolled at New York's Columbia University in 1921 where he spent a relatively undistinguished year until he was taken ill and was laid up for some weeks. It was during this illness (a Rear Window–like confinement involving a gangrenous foot, according to one version of the story) that Woolrich started writing, producing Cover Charge, which was published in 1926." Cover Charge was one of his Jazz Age novels inspired by the work of F. Scott Fitzgerald. A second short story, "Children of the Ritz", won Woolrich the first prize of $10,000 the following year in a competition organised by College Humor and First National Pictures; this led to his working as a screenwriter in Hollywood for First National Pictures. While in Hollywood, Woolrich explored his sexuality, apparently engaging in what Francis M. Nevins Jr. describes as "promiscuous and clandestine homosexual activity" and by marrying Violet Virginia Blackton, the 21-year-old daughter of J. Stuart Blackton, one of the founders of the Vitagraph studio. Failing in both his attempt at marriage and at establishing a career as a screenwriter (the unconsummated marriage was annulled in 1933; Woolrich garnered no screen credits), Woolrich sought to resume his life as a novelist: When he turned to pulp and detective fiction, Woolrich's output was so prolific his work was often published under one of his many pseudonyms. For example, "William Irish" was the byline in Dime Detective Magazine (February 1942) on his 1942 story "It Had to Be Murder", which was the source of the 1954 Alfred Hitchcock movie Rear Window and itself based on H.G. Wells' short story "Through a Window". François Truffaut filmed Woolrich's The Bride Wore Black and Waltz into Darkness in 1968 and 1969, respectively, the latter as Mississippi Mermaid. Ownership of the copyright in Woolrich's original story "It Had to Be Murder" and its use for Rear Window was litigated before the US Supreme Court in Stewart v. Abend, 495 U.S. 207 (1990). Woolrich phased out the use of pseudonyms by the early 1950s, so that even though "It Had To Be Murder" was credited on initial publication to "William Irish", Rear Window credited its story on-screen to Cornell Woolrich. He returned to New York, where he and his mother moved into the Hotel Marseilles (Broadway and West 103rd Street on Manhattan's Upper West Side). Eddie Duggan observes that "[a]lthough his writing made him wealthy, Woolrich and his mother lived in a series of seedy hotel rooms, including the squalid Hotel Marseilles apartment building in Harlem [sic], among a group of thieves, prostitutes and lowlifes that would not be out of place in Woolrich's dark fictional world." Woolrich lived there until his mother's death on October 6, 1957, which prompted his move to the slightly more upscale Hotel Franconia (20 West 72nd Street near Central Park). Duggan wrote: [After] Woolrich's mother died in 1957, he [went] into a sharp physical and mental decline. In later years, he socialized on occasion in Manhattan bars with Mystery Writers of America colleagues and younger fans such as writer Ron Goulart. He moved later to the Sheraton-Russell on Park Avenue and became a virtual recluse. In his 60s, with his eyesight failing, lonely, wracked by guilt over his homosexuality, tortured by self-doubt, alcoholic and a diabetic, Woolrich neglected himself to such a degree that he allowed a foot infection to become gangrenous which resulted, early in 1968, in the amputation of a leg. After the amputation and a conversion to Catholicism, Woolrich returned to the Sheraton-Russell, requiring the use of a wheelchair. Some of the staff there would take Woolrich down to the lobby so he could look out on the passing traffic. Woolrich did not attend the premiere of Truffaut's film of his novel The Bride Wore Black in 1968, even though it was held in New York City. He died September 25, 1968. Woolrich bequeathed his estate of about $850,000 to Columbia University to endow scholarships in his mother's memory for writing students. His papers are also kept at the Columbia University Libraries.

• Year — Title — Author Credit — Notes • 1926 — Cover Charge — Cornell Woolrich • 1927 — Children of the Ritz — Cornell Woolrich • 1929 — Times Square — Cornell Woolrich • 1930 — A Young Man's Heart — Cornell Woolrich • 1931 — The Time of Her Life — Cornell Woolrich • 1932 — Manhattan Love Song — Cornell Woolrich • 1940 — The Bride Wore Black — Cornell Woolrich • 1941 — The Black Curtain — Cornell Woolrich • 1941 — Marihuana — William Irish — Published in paperback only • 1942 — Black Alibi — Cornell Woolrich • 1942 — Phantom Lady — William Irish • 1943 — The Black Angel — Cornell Woolrich • 1944 — The Black Path of Fear — Cornell Woolrich • 1944 — Deadline at Dawn — William Irish — Also published as an Armed Services Edition • 1945 — Night Has a Thousand Eyes — George Hopley • 1947 — Waltz Into Darkness — William Irish • 1948 — Rendezvous in Black — Cornell Woolrich • 1948 — I Married a Dead Man — William Irish • 1950 — Savage Bride — Cornell Woolrich — Published in paperback only • 1950 — Fright — George Hopley • 1951 — You'll Never See Me Again — Cornell Woolrich — Published in paperback only • 1951 — Strangler's Serenade — William Irish • 1952 — Eyes That Watch You — William Irish • 1952 — Bluebeard's Seventh Wife — William Irish — Published in paperback only • 1959 — Death is My Dancing Partner — Cornell Woolrich — Published only in paperback • 1960 — The Doom Stone — Cornell Woolrich — Published only in paperback • 1987 — Into the Night — Cornell Woolrich — (Posthumous release, manuscript completed by Lawrence Block)

Cornell Woolrich was born on 4 December 1903 in New York City. Woolrich held the nationality of United States. Woolrich was educated at Columbia University. Woolrich worked as writer, novelist, screenwriter and crime fiction writer. Woolrich was active from 1926. The fields Woolrich worked in include detective fiction. Woolrich worked in English. Woolrich died on 25 September 1968 in New York City. Woolrich is buried at Ferncliff Cemetery.

• Year — Title — Author Credit — Notes • 1943 — I Wouldn't Be in Your Shoes — William Irish — Also published as an Armed Services Edition. • 1944 — After-Dinner Story — William Irish — Includes his noted 1941 novella "Marihuana". Also published as an Armed Services Edition. • 1946 — If I Should Die Before I Wake — William Irish — Published in paperback only. • 1946 — Borrowed Crime — William Irish — Published in paperback only. • 1946 — The Dancing Detective — William Irish • 1948 — Dead Man Blues — William Irish • 1949 — The Blue Ribbon — William Irish • 1950 — Somebody on the Phone — William Irish — AKA Deadly Night Call • 1950 — Six Nights of Mystery — William Irish — Published in paperback only. • 1956 — Nightmare — Cornell Woolrich — Includes both previously published and unpublished stories. • 1958 — Violence — Cornell Woolrich — Includes both previously published and unpublished stories. • 1958 — Hotel Room — Cornell Woolrich • 1959 — Beyond the Night — Cornell Woolrich — Published in paperback only. • 1965 — The Dark Side of Love — Cornell Woolrich • 1965 — The Ten Faces of Cornell Woolrich — Cornell Woolrich • 1971 — Nightwebs — Cornell Woolrich • 1978 — Angels of Darkness — Cornell Woolrich — Introduction by Harlan Ellison. • 1981 — The Fantastic Stories of Cornell Woolrich — Cornell Woolrich • 1983 — Four by Cornell Woolrich — Cornell Woolrich • 1984 — Rear Window — Cornell Woolrich • 1985 — Vampire's Honeymoon — Cornell Woolrich • 1985 — Blind Date with Death — Cornell Woolrich • 1985 — Darkness at Dawn — Cornell Woolrich • 1998 — The Cornell Woolrich Omnibus — Cornell Woolrich • 2003 — Night and Fear — Cornell Woolrich • 2005 — Tonight Somewhere in New York — Cornell Woolrich • 2010 — Four Novellas of Fear — Cornell Woolrich • 2011 — Love and Night — Cornell Woolrich