Will Durant (1885-1981) was an American historian who helped to popularize philosophy and history for a general reading audience in his native country. Raised in New Jersey, his mother had hoped he would become a seminarian, but his early readings in philosophy turned him away from religion.

Durant received his PhD in philosophy from Columbia University in 1917. He spent many years as a teacher, including at Seton Hall University, but spent most of his life as a full-time writer and speaker once his published works became popular. The Story of Philosophy (1926) was his first book, selling millions of copies. In 1912, he met Chaya Kaufman, a 14-year-old immigrant from Russia whom Durant was teaching at the Francisco Ferror School, an anarchist-sponsored secondary school. They married the following year, and he renamed her “Ariel” after the sprite in Shakespeare’s The Tempest. She became his collaborator, coauthoring many of his books and helping his research on others. They jointly won the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 1977, and they died within two weeks of one another in 1981.

Durant remains best known for writing The Story of Civilization, an 11-volume account covering over 10,000 years of human history.