Wright Morris (1910–1998)
Autor(a) de Plains Song: For Female Voices
About the Author
Early in his career, Wright Morris was called by Mark Schorer "probably the most original young novelist writing in the United States." In 1968 Leon Howard wrote: "Wright Morris has been the most consistently original of American novelists for a quarter of a century." Since then, the University of mostrar mais Nebraska Press has brought out new editions of his first 17 novels. Although both critical and popular appreciation of his work continues to grow slowly, there is a general consensus that he ranks high among contemporary American novelists. Born in Central City, Nebraska, the Lone Tree of his fiction, Morris attended Pomona College in California and had an academic career chiefly at San Francisco State University until his retirement in 1975. Nebraska and California have provided the main settings for his work, but he has traveled widely here and abroad, and some of his best novels relate the picaresque odysseys made by engaging characters. For instance, his first novel, My Uncle Dudley (1942), is a fictionalized account of a trip to California with his father that motherless Morris made as a youth. When almost 30 years later Morris wrote about another east-to-west journey in Fire Sermon (1971), in which an old man and a boy encounter three young hippies, Granville Hicks called the book "simon-pure, dyed-in-the-wool honest-to-God Wright Morris of the very highest grade" (N.Y. Times). The Field of Vision (1956), which deals with "innocents abroad in Mexico," won the National Book Award for fiction in 1957 and ranks behind only Ceremony in Lone Tree (1960) as his most successful novel.Ceremony involves four generations at a family reunion as Morris ingeniously reconciles the past, present, and future in a story that avoids both nostalgia and the disillusionment of the you-can't-go-home-again theme that appears quite often in his other fiction. Critics attempting to define Morris's originality have emphasized his distinctive style---a Faulkner-like ability to draw characters that come alive as individuals, his cross-country Americanness, and a strong sense of place that may owe something to Morris's considerable gifts as a photographer. Morris's fine feeling for the conjunction of time and place is evident in his several books of photographs with text: The Inhabitants (1946), The Home Place (1948), God's Country and My People (1968), Photographs and Words, and Picture America (1982). Other nonfiction includes a collection of essays on contemporary social and political problems---A Bill of Rites, a Bill of Wrongs, a Bill of Goods (1967)---and two widely praised volumes of criticism---The Territory Ahead: Critical Iinterpretations in American Literature (1958) and Earthly Delights, Unearthly Adornments: American Writers as Image Makers. Two volumes of personal memoirs are Will's Boy (1981) and Solo: An American Dreamer in Europe, 1933--1934 (1983). (Bowker Author Biography) Writer and photographer Wright Morris was born in Central City, Nebraska on January 6, 1910. He was an English professor at San Francisco State College from 1963 - 1975. He wrote novels and photo-text books, which juxtapose photographs with fictional text. He won numerous awards including the 1956 National Book Award for The Field of Vision and the 1981 American Book Award for Fiction for Plains Song: For Female Voices. He died on April 25, 1998. (Bowker Author Biography) mostrar menos
Obras por Wright Morris
Time Pieces: Photographs, Writing, and Memory (Aperture Writers & Artists on Photography) (1983) 49 exemplares
The Loneliness of the Long Distance Writer: The Works of Love & the Huge Season (1995) 15 exemplares
About fiction; reverent reflections on the nature of fiction with irreverent observations on writers, readers & other… (1975) 12 exemplares
Wright Morris : structures and artifacts : photographs, 1933-1954 : March 13-April 4, 1976, Sioux City Art Center,… (1975) 5 exemplares
The Mississippi River reader 3 exemplares
Fellow-Creatures [short story] 1 exemplar
The Mississippi Reader 1 exemplar
Associated Works
Etiquetado
Conhecimento Comum
- Nome legal
- Morris, Wright Marion
- Data de nascimento
- 1910-01-06
- Data de falecimento
- 1998-04-25
- Sexo
- male
- Nacionalidade
- USA
- Local de nascimento
- Central City, Nebraska, USA
- Locais de residência
- Central City, Nebraska, USA
Pacific Palisades, California, USA - Ocupações
- photographer
novelist
essayist
uninversity professor - Prémios e menções honrosas
- Whiting Writers' Award (1985)
Robert Kirsch Award (1981)
Western Literature Association's Distinguished Achievement Award (1979)
American Academy of Arts and Letters Academy Award (Literature, 1960)
Membros
Críticas
Listas
Prémios
You May Also Like
Associated Authors
Estatísticas
- Obras
- 52
- Also by
- 17
- Membros
- 1,302
- Popularidade
- #19,720
- Avaliação
- 3.8
- Críticas
- 13
- ISBN
- 124
- Línguas
- 4
- Marcado como favorito
- 5
The book is really of novella length and alternate chapters carry the point of view of Mr Ormsby and Mother. They are retired and Mr Ormsby is starting his day as usual at the bec and call of Mother, who is actually his wife. They had a son Virgil referred to as the boy, but he was killed in the second world war at Guadalcanal. Mother no longer finds it necessary to speak to Mr Ormsby apart from calling for him and writes a series of notes that amount to tasks for the day. Mother is an expert on wild birds and from time to time lectures to interested groups. Mr Ormsby does not go out much spending his time catering to Mother. Mother has received a notification from the American Navy that they are about to name a boat after their son for his heroic service in the war. Mr Ormsby must find his old travelling bag which has been mouldering in the loft for many years. They take the train and Mr Ormsby sits apart from his wife, next to a service man; private Lupido. A strange conversation about the candling of eggs ensues. Lupido is described as having an overlarge head and a boyish face and easily takes offence. Mr Ormsby invites him to come along with them to the commemoration service at the Brooklyn naval yard. The novel features strong female characters whose command and energy contrasts with the rather foolish men in their life.
Wright Morris was an American novelist, photographer and essayist and according to Wikipedia was known for his portrayals of people and artifacts of the Great Plains. His most read novels were [The field of Vision ]1956 and [Plains Song: for female voices] 1980. Man and boy with its rather curious perspective of the dominant female and its sense of characters isolated from the rest of the world, holds the readers attention. We are immediately immersed in the odd, ironic, humorous world created by Wright Morris to the extant that we don't question its existence. It is a rather slight novel, but I enjoyed it well enough 3 stars.… (mais)