Complex sentence: After moving to the US, de Man worked as a bookstore clerk impressed and befriended the writer Mary McCarthy and then somehow worked his way into higher education, first at Bard and later moving to Yale, despite his lack of an undergraduate degree.
Split into simpler sentences: After moving to the US, de Man worked as a bookstore clerk. He impressed and befriended the writer Mary McCarthy and then somehow worked his way into higher education, first at Bard and later moving to Yale, despite his lack of an undergraduate degree.