Stephen Vincent Benet

Stephen Vincent Benét (July 22, 1898–March 13, 1943) was a United States author, poet, short story writer and novelist, best known for his narrative poem of the American Civil War, "John Brown's Body," (1928, awarded a Pulitzer prize) and for his fantasy short story "The Devil and Daniel Webster," which won an O. Henry award, and furnished the material for a one-act opera by Douglas Moore.

A graduate of Yale University, he was awarded a posthumous Pulitzer Prize in 1944 for "Western Star" (1943), an unfinished narrative poem on the settling of America.

His brother, William Rose Benét (1886–1950), was a poet, anthologist and critic who is largely remembered for his desk reference, The Reader's Cyclopedia, (1948) which remains useful.