Richard Ford

This article is about the American author. For other people, seeRichard Ford (disambiguation).

Richard Ford
Ford in 2013
Born	(1944-02-16)February 16, 1944 Jackson, Mississippi,U.S.
Occupation	Novelist,short storywriter
Nationality	American
Education	Michigan State University(BA) University of California, Irvine(MFA)
Period	1976–present
Genre	Literary fiction
Literary movement	Minimalism Dirty realism

Richard Ford(born February 16, 1944) is an Americannovelistandshort storyauthor, and writer of a series of novels featuring the character Frank Bascombe.

Ford's first collection of short stories,Rock Springs,was published in 1987.

In the United States, Ford received the 1996Pulitzer Prizefor his novelIndependence Day.In Spain, he won thePrincess of Asturias Awardfor 2016. In 2018, Ford received thePark Kyong-ni Prize,an international literary award from South Korea.

His novelWildlifewas adapted into a2018 film of the same name,and in 2023 Ford publishedBe Mine,his fifth work of fiction chronicling the life of Frank Bascombe.

Early life

Ford was born inJackson, Mississippi,the only son of Parker Carrol and Edna Ford. Parker was a traveling salesman forFaultless Starch,aKansas Citycompany. Of his mother, Ford said, "Her ambition was to be, first, in love with my father and, second, to be a full-time mother." When Ford was eight years old, his father had a severeheart failure,and thereafter Ford spent as much time with his grandfather, a formerprizefighterand hotel owner inLittle Rock, Arkansas,as he did with his parents in Mississippi.Ford's father died of a second heart attack in 1960. In Jackson, Ford lived across the street from the home of authorEudora Welty.

Ford's grandfather had worked for a railroad. At the age of 19, before deciding to attend college, Ford began work on theMissouri Pacifictrain line as a locomotive engineer's assistant, learning the work while doing the job.

Ford received aB.A.degree fromMichigan State University.Having enrolled to study hotel management, he switched to English. After graduating, he taught junior high school inFlint, Michigan,and enlisted in theUnited States Marine Corpsbut was discharged after contractinghepatitis.At university he met Kristina Hensley, his future wife and they married in 1968.

Despite milddyslexia,Ford developed a serious interest inliterature.He has stated in interviews that his dyslexia may have helped him as a reader since it forced him to read books slowly and thoughtfully.

Ford briefly attended law school but quit and participated with the creative writing program at theUniversity of California, Irvine,to pursue aMaster of Fine Artsdegree, which he received in 1970. Ford chose this course simply because "they admitted me. I remember getting the application forIowaand thinking they'd never have let me in. I'm sure I was right about that too. But typical of me, I didn't know who was teaching at Irvine. I didn't know it was important to know such things. I wasn't the most curious of young men, even though I give myself credit for not letting that deter me. "Actually,Oakley HallandE. L. Doctorowwere teaching there and Ford has acknowledged they influenced him.In 1971, he was selected for a three-year appointment in theUniversity of MichiganSociety of Fellows.

Early career

Ford published his first novel,A Piece of My Heart,the story of two unlikely drifters whose paths cross on an island in theMississippi River,during 1976, and followed it withThe Ultimate Good Luckduring 1981. During the interim he briefly taught atWilliams CollegeandPrinceton University.Despite good notices, the books sold little, and Ford retired from fiction writing to become a writer for theNew YorkmagazineInside Sports."I realized," Ford said, "there was probably a wide gulf between what I could do and what would succeed with readers. I felt that I'd had a chance to write two novels, and neither of them had really created much stir, so maybe I should find real employment, and earn my keep."

During 1982, the magazine was terminated, and whenSports Illustrateddid not hire Ford, he resumed writing fiction, composingThe Sportswriter,about a failed novelist turned sportswriter who undergoes an emotional crisis after the death of his son. It was named one ofTimemagazine's five best books of 1986 and was a finalist for thePEN/Faulkner Award for Fiction.Ford followed up that success withRock Springs(1987),a story collection —set mostly inMontana—that includes what remain some of his most anthologized short stories.

Mid-career and acclaim

Ford's 1990 novelWildlife,a story of aMontanagolf professional turned firefighter, met with mixed reviews and middling sales, but by the end of the 1990s Ford was increasingly sought after as an editor and contributor to various projects. Ford edited the 1990The Best American Short Stories,the 1992GrantaBook of the American Short Story,the Fall 1996 "fiction issue" ofPloughshares,and the 1998Granta Book of the American Long Story.In the latter volume's "Introduction," Ford stipulated that he preferred the designation "long story" instead of the term "novella." For the publishing projectLibrary of America,Ford edited a two-volume edition of the selected works of the Mississippi writerEudora Welty,which was published during 1998.

During 1995, Ford published the novelIndependence Day,a sequel toThe Sportswriter,featuring the continued story of its protagonist, Frank Bascombe. Reviews were positive, and the novel became the first to win both thePEN/Faulkner Award for Fictionand thePulitzer Prize for Fiction.During the same year, Ford was chosen as winner of theRea Award for the Short Story,for outstanding achievement for that genre.He ended the 1990s with a well-received collection of short stories,Women With Men,published during 1997. TheParis Reviewtermed him a "master" of the short story genre.

Later life and writings

Richard Ford photographed byOliver Mark,Berlin 2002

Ford lived for many years inNew Orleansin theFrench Quarter,on lowerBourbon Streetthen in theGarden Districtof the same city, where his wife, Kristina, was the executive director of the city planning commission. For a while Ford and his wife resided inEast Boothbay, Maine.As of 2023, Ford lives inBillings, Montanawhere he bought a house.During the intervening years, Ford lived in other locations, usually in the United States, as he pursued aperipateticteaching career.

He obtained a teaching appointment atBowdoin Collegeduring 2005 but kept the job for only one semester.During 2008 Ford was an adjunct professor of theOscar Wilde Centrewith the School of English atTrinity College Dublin,Ireland, teaching in the Masters programme in creative writing.Starting December 29, 2010, Ford assumed the job of senior fiction professor at theUniversity of Mississippiduring the autumn of 2011, replacingBarry Hannah,who died during March 2010. During the autumn of 2012, he became the Emmanuel Roman and Barrie Sardoff Roman Professor of the Humanities and Professor of Writing at theColumbia University School of the Arts.

As the new century commenced, he published another story collection,A Multitude of Sins(2002), followed by the novelsThe Lay Of The Land,—the third in his Bascombe series— in 2006 andCanada,published during May 2012.According to Ford,The Lay Of The Landcompleted his series of Bascombe novels butCanadawas a stand-alone novel.

In April 2013, Ford read from a new Frank Bascombe story without revealing to the audience whether it was part of a longer work.By 2014, it was confirmed that the story was to appear in the bookLet Me Be Frank With You,published during November of that year.The latter work consists of four interconnected novellas (or "long stories" ), all narrated by Frank Bascombe.Let Me Be Frank With Youwas a finalist for the 2015 Pulitzer Prize in Fiction. It did not win the prize but the selection committee praised the book for its "unflinching series of narratives, set in the aftermath ofHurricane Sandy,insightfully portraying a society in decline. "

As in the preceding decade, Ford continued to assist with various editing projects. During 2007, he edited theNewGrantaBook of the American Short Storyand in 2011 he editedBlue Collar, White Collar, No Collar: Stories of Work.During May 2017, Ford published a memoir,Between Them: Remembering My Parents.

In 2018,Wildlifewas adapted into afilm of the same nameby directorPaul Danoand screenwriterZoe Kazan.It was released to widespread critical acclaim.

In 2020, Ford's short story collection,Sorry For Your Trouble,was published. His novel,Be Mine,was published in June 2023 and is the fifth —and presumably final— book in Ford's so-called "Bascombe series."

Reception

Ford began publishing his short stories in the 1980s, which corresponded with an American renaissance in the short story that centered aroundRaymond Carver(1938–1988).So there was a tendency early on to associate Ford's stories inRock Springswithminimalismand its offshoot, an aesthetic style known asDirty realismthat referred to Carver's lower-middle-class subjects or the protagonists Ford portrays inRock Springs."Dirty realism" and "minimalism" came to be associated with a long list of writers during the 1970s and 1980s, includingTobias Wolff,Ann Beattie,Frederick Barthelme,Larry Brown,Jayne Anne Phillips,andGordon Lish.

However, many of the characters in the novels about Frank Bascombe (The Sportswriter,Independence Day,The Lay of the Land,Let Me Be Frank With You,Be Mine), including the protagonist, enjoy degrees of material affluence andcultural capitalnot normally associated with dirty realism.

Ford's writing demonstrates "a meticulous concern for the nuances of language... [and] the rhythms of phrases and sentences". He has described his sense of language as "a source of pleasure in itself—- all of its corporeal qualities, its syncopations, moods, sounds, the way things look on the page". Besides this "devotion to language" is what he terms "the fabric of affection that holds people close enough together to survive".

Comparisons have been drawn between Ford's work and the writings ofJohn Updike,William Faulkner,Ernest HemingwayandWalker Percy.Ford resists such comparisons, commenting, "You can't write... on the strength of influence. You can only write a good story or a good novel by yourself."

Ford's works of fiction "dramatize the breakdown of such cultural institutions as marriage, family, and community," and his "marginalized protagonists often typify the rootlessness and nameless longing... pervasive in a highly mobile, present-oriented society in which individuals, having lost a sense of the past, relentlessly pursue their own elusive identities in the here and now."Ford "looks to art, rather than religion, to provide consolation and redemption in a chaotic time."

Controversies

Ford once sentAlice Hoffmana copy of one of her books with bullet holes in it after she angered him by unfavorably reviewingThe Sportswriter.

In 2004, Ford spat onColson Whiteheadwhen encountering him at a party two years after Whitehead published a negative review ofA Multitude of SinsinThe New York Times.Thirteen years later, Ford remained unrepentant. Writing inEsquirein 2017, Ford declared that "as of today, I don't feel any different about Mr. Whitehead, or his review, or my response."

Awards and honors

• 1987Mississippi Institute of Arts and Letters Awardin Fiction forThe Sportswriter;again in 2007 forThe Lay of the Land;and in 2013 forCanada
• 1995Rea Award for the Short Story,for outstanding achievement in that genre
• 1996PEN/Faulkner Award,forIndependence Day
• 1996Pulitzer Prize for Fiction,forIndependence Day
• 2001PEN/Malamud Award,for excellence in short fiction
• 2005St. Louis Literary Awardfrom theSaint Louis UniversityLibrary Associates
• 2008Kenyon Review Award for Literary Achievement
• 2013Prix Femina étranger,forCanada
• 2013Andrew Carnegie Medal for Excellence in Fiction,forCanada
• 2015Fitzgerald Award for Achievement in American Literaturepart of theF. Scott Fitzgerald Literary Festival
• 2015Pulitzer Prize for Fiction,finalist, forLet Me Be Frank with You
• 2016Princess of Asturias Awardin Literature
• 2018Park Kyong-ni Prize
• 2018Siegfried Lenz Prize
• 2019Library of Congress Prize for American Fiction

Selected works

Novels

• A Piece of My Heart(1976)
• The Ultimate Good Luck(1981)
• The Sportswriter(1986)
• Wildlife(1990)
• Independence Day(1995)
• The Lay of the Land(2006)
• Canada(2012)
• Let Me Be Frank With You(2014)
• Be Mine(2023)

Story collections

• Rock Springs(1987)
• Women with Men: Three Stories(1997)
• A Multitude of Sins(2002)
• Vintage Ford(2004)
• Sorry for Your Trouble(2020)

Memoir

• Between Them: Remembering My Parents(2017)

Screenplays

• Bright Angel(1990)

As contributor or editor

• TheGrantaBook of the American Short Story(1992)
• The Granta Book of the American Long Story(1999)
• The Essential Tales of Chekhov(1999)
• Foreword toAlec Soth,NIAGARA(Göttingen, Germany: Steidl, 2006)
• The New Granta Book of the American Short Story(2007)
• Blue Collar, White Collar, No Collar: Stories of Work(2012)
• Foreword to Maude Schuyler Clay,Mississippi History(Göttingen, Germany: Steidl, 2015)

References

Works cited

• Guagliardo, Huey (ed.)Conversations with Richard FordJackson, Mississippi: University Press of Mississippi, 2001.ISBN978-1-57806-406-9
• Guagliardo, Huey.Perspectives on Richard Ford: Redeemed by Affection.Jackson, Mississippi: University Press of Mississippi, 2000.ISBN978-1-57806-234-8

Further reading

• Armengol, Joseph M.Richard Ford and the Fiction of Masculinities.New York: Peter Lang, 2010.ISBN978-143311-086-3
• Duffy, Brian.Morality, Identity and Narrative in the Fiction of Richard Ford.New York: Rodopi, 2008.ISBN978-904202-409-0
• McGuire, Ian.Richard Ford and the Ends of Realism.Iowa City, Iowa: University of Iowa Press, 2015.ISBN978-1-60938-343-5
• Walker, Elinor.Richard Ford.New York: Twayne Publishers, 2000.ISBN0805716793

External links

Work

• "Nobody's Everyman",Bookforum(Apr/May 2009)
• Leaving for Kenosha,The New Yorker(2008)
• How Was it to be Dead?,The New Yorker(2006)

Profiles

• Bibliography,University of Mississippi
• Profile,Ploughshares
• Richard FordatIMDb
• Overview of Ford's recent career, and critique of short storiesinThe Walrusmagazine

Interviews

• Interview on the 7th Avenue Project radio showRichard Ford discusses his Frank Bascombe novels, his approach to fiction and his life.
• Lyons, Bonnie (Fall 1996)."Richard Ford, The Art of Fiction No. 147".Paris Review.Fall 1996 (140).
• "Armistead Maupin: Brisbane Writers' Festival – RN Book Show – 23 January 2008".Abc.net.au. 2008-01-23.Retrieved2011-08-19.– Transcript of interview withRamona Koval,The Book Show,ABC Radio National31 December 2007
• Interview for public radio in Maine (2006),Maine Humanities Council
• Interview (1996)Archived2000-05-22 at theWayback Machine,Salon
• Interview onWriter's Voice(2006)with radio host, Francesca Rheannon
• Interview (2002),IdentityTheory
• Interview (2006)Archived2013-01-30 atarchive.today,The New Yorker
• Interview (2006),Nerve
• Interview, book reading, and discussion video streams and MP3 download (2006),University of Pennsylvania
• Interview February 2007;Pulitzer Prize-winning author talks with Robert Birnbaum about his latest Frank Bascombe novel,The Lay of the Land
• Richard Ford: Shooting for the stars.Video interview byLouisiana Channel2012.
• Interview (2016),The Ringer (website)

Archival collections

• Guide to The Ultimate Good Luck Galley Proofs.Special Collections and Archives, The UC Irvine Libraries, Irvine, California.
• Richard Ford Collectionowned by the University of Mississippi Department of Archives and Special Collections.