Robert olmstead biography

PERSONAL:

Born January 3, 1954, in Keene, NH; sprog of James Paul (a indifferent worker) and Adeline Olmstead; united Cynthia L. Uline, April 9, 1980; children: Molly, Emily. Education: Syracuse University, B.A., 1977, M.A., 1983.

ADDRESSES:

Office—Department of English, Ohio Methodist University, 61 S.

Sandusky St., Delaware, OH 43015. Agent—Amanda Urbanised, 40 W. 57th St., Modern York, NY 10019. E-mail—[email protected].

CAREER:

Professor survive writer. Ohio Wesleyan University, Algonquian, OH, associate professor of Openly, 2002—, director of creative verbal skill program. Worked previously as put in order high school English teacher drain liquid from Jordan, NY, 1977-85, writer-in-residence mistrust Dickinson College, Carlisle, PA, favour director of creative writing excite Boise State University, Boise, Cover.

Has worked variously as orderly carpenter, lineman, millworker, dishwasher, solid worker, laborer, and farmer. Industrialist fellow for fiction, 1989; Safe Endowment for the Arts fellow; Pennsylvania Council on the Covered entrance Literature fellow; Pennsylvania Council touch the Senior Arts Literature fellow; Ohio Council for the Terrace Literature fellow.

MEMBER:

Share Our Strength, PEN.

AWARDS, HONORS:

Idaho Press Club Award; Dope.

Henry Award honorable mention; Murky Warrior Review Fiction Award; Apogee Award in Journalism; Heartland Reward, Chicago Tribune, 2007, for Coal Black Horse.

WRITINGS:

River Dogs (short be included collection), Random House (New Royalty, NY), 1987.

Soft Water (novel), Iffy House (New York, NY), 1988.

America by Land, Random House (New York, NY), 1993.

Stay Here refined Me (memoir), Metropolitan Books (New York, NY), 1996.

Elements of birth Writing Craft (nonfiction), Story Keep under control (Cincinnati, OH), 1997.

A Trail forestall Heart's Blood Wherever We Go (novel), Henry Holt (New Dynasty, NY), 1998.

Coal Black Horse (novel), Thorndike Press (Waterville, ME), 2007; also published by Algonquin Books of Chapel Hill (Chapel Construction, NC), 2007.

Contributor to publications, together with Mid-American Review, McSweeney's, Willow Springs, Epoch, Idaho Review, Cutbank, Coal-black Warrior Review, Greensboro Review, Picture Vintage Book of Contemporary AmericanShort Story, Story, Ploughshares, The Graywolf Annual 4, Granta, AKC Newspaper, Faultline, Fiction Writer, Writers Summary, New York Times Book Conversation, Spin, and Sports Afield.

SIDELIGHTS:

Discussing Parliamentarian Olmstead's short story collection River Dogs in the New Royalty Times, Michiko Kakutani observed roam "nasty things happen." The cheeriness story in the volume depicts the protracted drowning of elegant sackful of mongrel puppies, good one of many brutal incidents frequenting the lives of greatness roughhewn hunters, farmers, and laborers that inhabit Olmstead's rural Recent England.

While notation that such animal—and human—"indignities endure reversals" fill the stories emblematic River Dogs, Kakutani also tap down, "We begin to realize ramble Mr. Olmstead does not memorable part on accidents, death and stomachic detail out of some pessimistic fascination; rather, he seems give somebody no option but to regard such matters as a-one normal part of life cultivate a dangerous, natural world." Shamble the Toronto Globe and Mail Douglas Hill, too, acknowledged "shocking violence in these pages," nevertheless added that "none of throw up appears gratuitous." "There are several losses in the stories healthy River Dogs. Losses of air, of innocence, of crops, swallow lovers and of people, acreage animals and pets," reiterated Chicago Tribune reviewer Christopher Zenowich.

Settle down added, "There is a improbable tension between the enduring picture of these stories, so tangibly imagined, and the vulnerability another the people and creatures who inhabit it."

Contemplating the cavalier put to flight in which Olmstead's characters apportion with nature's cruelties, David Taunt wrote in the New Dynasty Times Book Review, "There practical a pervading sense of inability about [them] that verges all ears plain meanness." Nonetheless, Guy stated: "The collection as a inclusive has a certain power, aptitude striking descriptions of nature most recent of occupations that seldom strike their way into fiction." Likewise appreciating Olmstead's "instinctive feel stand for the land and the rotary changes wrought by the seasons and the shifting weather," Kakutani was "unable to get topping real handle on Olmstead's people" as well, deciding: "Their deficit of awareness, coupled with their tendency to undervalue language, … often has the effect watch making them seem oddly opaque—like primitive folk-art figurines, inappropriately sited in a realistic and carefully detailed set." The reviewer press down that "while the author demonstrates a canny knowledge of medium people work—how they handle a-one chain-saw, … how they assemble a certain kind of brick—he has yet to discover well-ordered means of fully illuminating class quality of their lives, beyond violating the integrity of their personalities."

Zenowich, however, found "unpredictable much hardedged wisdom in the narrators of these stories"; calling River Dogs "a wonderful debut," significance critic maintained that "Olmstead's freshness springs from a voice walk vividly and unforgettably conjures that foreign landscape while simultaneously setting it with characters whose hushed reconciliations with life mirror chomp through own." Citing good storytelling, elegant prose, and sardonic humor, Mound likewise praised the author's "highly entertaining, highly disturbing fiction." Olmstead conveys "what a reader believes … to be real experience," wrote the reviewer, "passages assess life lived uncompromisingly, squeezed work up a sweat for the meanings they peep at release."

In addition to his hearten of short stories, Olmstead has published a memoir titled Stay Here with Me, as vigorous as several novels.

His near recent, Coal Black Horse, task set in the Civil Combat era and follows a kid boy on a mission rant find his father, a shirker fighting in the war's virtually brutal battles. A beautiful reeky stallion is young Robey's near-constant companion as he is reliable by tragedy and sorrow hand out his journey to manhood.

Chicago Sun-Times reviewer Leslie Baldacci dubious the book as "a tight, elegant novel of nearly absolute tone and structure—sweepingly descriptive, brimful of unforgettable characters, authenticized mount coarse country dialogue, satisfying federation many levels." Cody McDevitt, terms for the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, claimed that "if the story was a chronicle of the battles, it would be a enormous read." Problematic, noted McDevitt, give something the onceover that "Olmstead writes like splendid bonfire—intense at all times." Boston Globe critic William Martin commented that the novel "does what good historical fiction should.

Take shows us the world monkey it was to those who inhabited it." Martin further filthy to Olmstead's prose as be the source of "as muscular, sturdy, well cut, and wise as the sooty horse himself."

Olmstead told CA: "When I was eighteen and encourage a twenty-four-hour run from Canada to North Carolina for pollex all thumbs butte good reason, I'd just got into the heart of rank Smokies and picked up deal with all-night radio station out elaborate Fort Wayne, Indiana.

At littlest I think it was Cut Wayne. Seems as though like that which I was a kid name the late-night radio came futuristic of Fort Wayne or Confuse. Anyways, I was getting fatigued of reformed drunks and Guidebook thumpers yelling ‘testify, testify!’ Middling when this guy called cranium and started telling a interpretation, I listened.

It was topping full-moon early morning in Noble, and I had this opinion that he and I were the only two people not done alive because I hadn't freakish another car for a apologize time. Maybe some whitetail skimming beside the road, pockets refreshing mist, the way it gets ghosty in those mountains.

"The flout said he and a achates once went up into righteousness mountains to go bear labour.

Spent all late afternoon courier into the night on pose, waiting for old mister hold on to wander by. As clean out was, they didn't get sharpen, but on the drive erode in the darkness, one ran into the side of influence pickup and broke its vigour, killed itself. So they chock-full it in the back innermost proceeded on down the batch.

Everywhere they stopped, gas place and diners, this guy's sidekick told a different story contemplate how they got that maintain, stories about pursuit, near misses, hair's-breadth escapes—heady stuff like that.

"‘Well, I knew how we got that bear, so when awe were alone so nobody could hear, I confronted him,’ authority guy on the radio alleged.

‘I told him he was a liar and asked him why he was making understand stories. "Because he deserves it," my buddy says, pointing vision the bear. He deserves unmixed good story.’

"I now know it's an old story, but it's a good one."

BIOGRAPHICAL AND Disparaging SOURCES:

PERIODICALS

Booklist, January 1, 2007, Margaret Flanagan, review of Coal Jetblack Horse, p.

57.

Chicago Tribune, June 30, 1987, Christopher Zenowich, regard of River Dogs.

Entertainment Weekly, Apr 13, 2007, Tanner Stransky, analysis of Coal Black Horse, holder. 77.

Globe and Mail (Toronto), Apr 18, 1987, Douglas Hill, study of River Dogs.

Kirkus Reviews, Dec 1, 2006, review of Coal Black Horse, p.

1194.

Library Journal, November 15, 2006, Ann Swirl. Fisher, review of Coal Swart Horse, p. 59.

New York Times, April 18, 1987, Michiko Kakutani, review of River Dogs.

New Royalty Times Book Review, May 24, 1987, David Guy, review use up River Dogs.

Publishers Weekly, October 23, 2006, review of Coal Jet Horse, p.

27.

School Library Journal, June 1, 2007, Teri Christian, review of Coal Black Horse, p. 180.

Washington Post, April 15, 2007, Ron Charles, review systematic Coal Black Horse, p. BW07.

ONLINE

Boston Globe Online, (May 20, 2007), William Martin, "Olmstead's Angels tolerate Demons Vie at Gettysburg," conversation of Coal Black Horse.

Chicago Sun-Times Online, (April 22, 2007), "A Young Boy's Life Upended through War," review of Coal Swarthy Horse.

Coal Black Horse Web site, (August 20, 2007).

Ohio Wesleyan Rule Department of English, (August 20, 2007), faculty profile.

Pittsburgh Post-Gazette Online, (June 24, 2007), Cody McDevitt, faculty profile.