Annie Proulx
Template:Short description Template:Use mdy dates Template:Infobox writer Edna Ann Proulx (Template:IPAc-en Template:Respell; born August 22, 1935) is an American novelist, short story writer, and journalist. She has written most frequently as Annie Proulx but has also used the names E. Annie Proulx and E.A. Proulx.<ref name=LC>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref>
She won the PEN/Faulkner Award for Fiction for her first novel, Postcards, making her the first woman to receive the prize.<ref name=":0">Template:Cite journal</ref> Her second novel, The Shipping News (1993), won both the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction<ref name=pulitzer/> and the U.S. National Book Award for Fiction<ref name=nba1993/> and was adapted as a 2001 film of the same name. Her short story "Brokeback Mountain" was adapted as an Academy Award, BAFTA and Golden Globe Award-winning motion picture released in 2005.
Personal life and educationEdit
Proulx was born Edna Ann Proulx in Norwich, Connecticut, to Lois Nellie (Template:Nee Gill) and Georges-Napoléon Proulx.<ref>NNDB</ref> Her first name honored one of her mother's aunts. She is of English and French-Canadian ancestry.<ref>Hennessy, D. M. (2007). Annie Proulx. In R. E. Lee & P. Meanor (Eds.), Dictionary of Literary Biography: Vol. 335. American Short-Story Writers Since World War II. Detroit: Gale.</ref><ref>Annie Proulx. (2013). In J. W. Hunter (Ed.), Contemporary Literary Criticism (Vol. 331). Detroit: Gale.</ref> Her maternal forebears came to America in 1635, 15 years after the Mayflower arrived.<ref>Jukka Petäjä, Maisema on ihmisen kehys ja varjo, Helsingin Sanomat, October 26, 2011, pg. C4. Template:In lang</ref>
Proulx lived in multiple states along the East Coast during her childhood as her father worked his way up through the textile industry.<ref name=":1">{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref><ref name=":2">{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref><ref name=":3">Template:Cite news</ref> She wrote her first story at the age of 10, while sick with chicken pox.<ref name=":1" /> She graduated from Deering High School in Portland, Maine.<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref> She briefly attended Colby College, where she met her first husband, H. Ridgely Bullock, Jr., and dropped out to marry him in 1955.<ref name=":2" /> She later returned to college, studying at the University of Vermont from 1966 to 1969, and graduated cum laude and Phi Beta Kappa with a B.A. in History in 1969. She earned her M.A. in history from Sir George Williams University (now Concordia University) in Montreal, Quebec in 1973.<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref> Proulx pursued a PhD at Concordia and passed her oral examinations in 1975, but abandoned her dissertation before completing the degree. In 1999, Concordia awarded her an honorary doctorate.<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref>
Proulx lived for more than 30 years in Vermont, has married and divorced three times, and has three sons and a daughter (Jonathan, Gillis, Morgan, and Sylvia). In 1994, she moved to Bird Cloud, a ranch in Saratoga, Wyoming, spending part of the year in northern Newfoundland on a small cove adjacent to L'Anse aux Meadows. As of 2019, Proulx lived in Port Townsend, Washington.<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref>
Writing career and recognitionEdit
Starting as a journalist, her first published work of fiction was "The Customs Lounge", a science fiction story published in the September 1963 issue of If, under the byline "E.A. Proulx".<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref>
A year later, her science fiction story "All the Pretty Little Horses" appeared in the teen magazine Seventeen in June 1964. She subsequently published stories in Esquire magazine and Gray's Sporting Journal in the late 1970s, as well as how-to manuals for cooking and gardening.<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref><ref name=":4">Template:Cite news</ref> Proulx published her first short-story collection, Heart Songs, in 1988 and her first novel, Postcards, in 1992.<ref name=":3" /> She was the first woman to receive the PEN/Faulkner Award, which was awarded to Postcards.<ref name=":5">Template:Cite book</ref> She was awarded a NEA fellowship and a Guggenheim fellowship in 1992.<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref><ref name=":0" /> Her 1993 novel The Shipping News was adapted into a 2001 film. Set in Newfoundland yet written by someone "from away"<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref> (not from Newfoundland), the novel stresses the vicarious quality of Proulx' writing.
She had the following comment on her celebrity status: <templatestyles src="Template:Blockquote/styles.css" />
It's not good for one's view of human nature, that's for sure. You begin to see, when invitations are coming from festivals and colleges to come read (for an hour for a hefty sum of money), that the institutions are head-hunting for trophy writers. Most don't particularly care about your writing or what you're trying to say. You're there as a human object, one that has won a prize. It gives you a very odd, meat-rack kind of sensation.<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation
|CitationClass=web }}</ref>{{#if:|{{#if:|}}
— {{#if:|, in }}Template:Comma separated entries}}
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In 1997, Proulx was awarded the Dos Passos Prize, a mid-career award for American writers.<ref name=":6">{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref> Proulx has twice won the O. Henry Prize for the year's best short story. In 1998, she won for "Brokeback Mountain", which had appeared in The New Yorker on October 13, 1997. Proulx won again the following year for "The Mud Below", which appeared in The New Yorker June 22 and 29, 1999. Both appear in her 1999 collection of short stories, Close Range: Wyoming Stories. The lead story in this collection, entitled "The Half-Skinned Steer", was selected by author Garrison Keillor for inclusion in The Best American Short Stories 1998, (Proulx herself edited the 1997 edition of this series) and later by novelist John Updike for inclusion in The Best American Short Stories of the Century (1999).<ref name=":5" />
In 2007, the composer Charles Wuorinen approached Proulx with the idea of turning her short story "Brokeback Mountain" into an opera. The opera of the same name with a libretto by Proulx herself premiered January 28, 2014, at the Teatro Real in Madrid. It was praised as an often brilliant adaptation that clearly conveyed the text of the libretto with music that is rich in imagination and variety.<ref name="wqxr">{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref><ref>William Jeffery, "Brokeback Mountain Opera Receives World Premiere", Limelight Magazine (January 30, 2014).</ref><ref>Westphal, Matthew (September 27, 2007). "'Gay 12-Tone Cowboys' - Composer Charles Wuorinen Plans Opera Version of Brokeback Mountain". Playbill. Retrieved October 3, 2013.</ref><ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref><ref name="NY Times Operatic">Template:Cite news</ref> Proulx published her first non-fiction book, Bird Cloud: A Memoir, largely based on her former Wyoming ranch of the same name.<ref name=":4" /><ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref> In 2017, she received the Fitzgerald Award for that year for Achievement in American Literature.<ref>F. Scott Fitzgerald Literary Festival; accessed March 24, 2022.</ref>
BibliographyEdit
{{ safesubst:#invoke:Unsubst||date=__DATE__ |$B=Template:AmboxTemplate:Main other }}
NonfictionEdit
- Template:Cite book
- Template:Cite book
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- Plan and Make Your Own Fences & Gates, Walkways, Walls & Drives (1983), Template:ISBN
- The Fine Art of Salad Gardening. 1985. Template:ISBN
- The Gourmet Gardener: Growing Choice Fruits and Vegetables with Spectacular Results (1987), Template:ISBN
- Template:Cite book
- Bird Cloud: A Memoir (2011), Template:ISBN
- Foreword (2018) In: Wild Migrations: Atlas of Wyoming's Ungulates. Alethea Y. Steingisser, Emilene Ostlind, Hall Sawyer, James E. Meacham, Matthew J. Kauffman, and William J. Rudd (Eds.).Template:ISBN
- Fen, Bog & Swamp: A Short History of Peatland Destruction and Its Role in the Climate Crisis (2022)<ref>Template:Cite news</ref>
EssayEdit
- Swamps Can Protect Against Climate Change, If We Only Let Them. In: The New Yorker, June 27, 2022 (July 4, 2022).
NovelsEdit
- Postcards (1992), Template:ISBN
- The Shipping News (1993), Template:ISBN
- Accordion Crimes (1996), Template:ISBN
- That Old Ace in the Hole (2002), Template:ISBN
- Barkskins (2016), Template:ISBN
Short fictionEdit
CollectionsEdit
- Heart Songs and Other Stories (1988), Template:ISBN; republished with altered but similar content as trade paperback Heart Songs (1994) Template:ISBN<ref>"Heart songs / E. Annie Proulx". Catalogue. National Library of Australia.</ref>
- Close Range: Wyoming Stories (1999), Template:ISBN
- Bad Dirt: Wyoming Stories 2 (2004), Template:ISBN
- Fine Just the Way It Is: Wyoming Stories 3 (2008), Template:ISBN
StoriesEdit
Title | Year | First published | Reprinted/collected | Notes |
---|---|---|---|---|
Rough deeds | 2013 | Template:Cite magazine | ||
A resolute man | 2016 | Template:Cite magazine |
Awards and recognitionEdit
- 1993—PEN/Faulkner Award for Fiction (Postcards)<ref name=":3" />
- 1993—Chicago Tribune Heartland Prize for Fiction, for The Shipping News<ref name=":1" />
- 1993—Irish Times International Fiction Prize, for The Shipping News<ref name=":1" />
- 1993—National Book Award, Fiction The Shipping News<ref name=nba1993>
"National Book Awards – 1993". National Book Foundation. Retrieved 2012-03-28.
(With acceptance speech by Proulx and essays by Bob Shacochis and Mark Sarvas from the Awards 60-year anniversary blog.)</ref>
- 1994—Pulitzer Prize, Fiction The Shipping News<ref name=pulitzer>
"Fiction". Past winners & finalists by category. The Pulitzer Prizes. Retrieved 2012-03-28.</ref>
- 1997—Shortlisted for the 1997 Orange Prize (Accordion Crimes)<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation
|CitationClass=web }}</ref>
- 1997—John Dos Passos Prize for Literature (for body of work)<ref name=":6" />
- 1998—"Half-Skinned Steer", The Best American Short Stories 1998
- 1998—"Brokeback Mountain", O. Henry Awards O. Henry Awards: Prize Stories 1998
- 1998—"Brokeback Mountain", National Magazine Award<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation
|CitationClass=web }}</ref>
- 1999—"The Mud Below," O. Henry Awards: Prize Stories 1999
- 1999—"The Bunchgrass Edge of the World," The Best American Short Stories 1999
- 1999—"Half-Skinned Steer", The Best American Short Stories of the Century, edited by John Updike<ref name=":5" />
- 2000—The New Yorker Book Award, Best Fiction 1999 (Close Range: Wyoming Stories)<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation
|CitationClass=web }}</ref>
- 2000—English-Speaking Union's Ambassador Book Award (Close Range: Wyoming Stories)<ref name=":7">Template:Cite journal</ref>
- 2000—"People in Hell Just Want a Drink of Water," The Best American Short Stories 2000
- 2000—Borders Original Voices Award in Fiction (Close Range, Wyoming Stories)<ref name=":7" />
- 2000—WILLA Literary Award, Women Writing the West<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation
|CitationClass=web }}</ref>
- 2002—Best Foreign Language Novels of 2002 / Best American Novel Award, Chinese Publishing Association and Peoples' Literature Publishing House (That Old Ace in the Hole)
- 2004—Aga Khan Prize for Fiction for "The Wamsutter Wolf"<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation
|CitationClass=web }}</ref>
- 2012—United States Artists Fellow award<ref>United States Artists Official Website</ref>
- 2017—National Book Foundation Medal for Distinguished Contribution to American Letters (lifetime achievement)<ref>Template:Cite news</ref>
- 2018—Library of Congress Prize for American Fiction<ref>Template:Cite news</ref>
AdaptationsEdit
- The Shipping News (2001) was directed by Lasse Hallström and featured Kevin Spacey as the protagonist Quoyle, Judi Dench as Agnis Hamm and Julianne Moore as Wavey Prowse.
- Brokeback Mountain (2005), directed by Ang Lee and starring Heath Ledger and Jake Gyllenhaal, was based on a story of the same name in Proulx's collection of short stories, Close Range.
- Barkskins, a National Geographic television series based on Proulx's 2016 novel, premiered on May 25, 2020.
ReferencesEdit
Further readingEdit
- "Annie Proulx." Contemporary Authors Online. Detroit: Gale, 2011.
- Hennessy, Denis M. "Annie Proulx." American Short-Story Writers Since World War II: Fifth Series. Ed. Richard E. Lee and Patrick Meanor. Detroit: Gale, 2007. Dictionary of Literary Biography Vol. 335.
External linksEdit
Template:Sister project Template:Sister project
- Template:Cite journal
- Books That Changed My Life PEN World Voices at the New York Public Library May 4, 2008
- An Interview with Annie Proulx Template:Webarchive, Bookslut, December 2005.
- Interview with Annie Proulx in the Fall 2005 Wyoming Library Roundup (PDF 3.69 MB)
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Template:PulitzerPrize Fiction 1976–2000 Template:NBA for Fiction 1975–1999 Template:Authority control