Barry Hannah

Barry Hannah, author of novels and short stories, was born in 1942 in Clinton, Mississippi. He earned a Bachelor of Arts from Mississippi College in 1964. He spent the next three years at the University of Arkansas where he earned a Master of Arts in 1966 and the Master of Fine Arts in 1967.

Related Topics:
Clinton, Mississippi - Mississippi College - University of Arkansas

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Hannah's first novel, the grotesque coming-of-age tale Geromino Rex (1972), won the William Faulkner Prize and was nominated for the National Book Award. Nightwatchmen (1973), Hannah's second novel was a flop, and is the only of his works which has not been reissued in paperback. Hannah returned to form, however, with the short-story collection Airships (1978), which today is considered a classic in its field. The short novel Ray (1980) was a critical success and a minor breakthrough for Hannah, and it is still considered one of his best novels. After the grotesque Western pastiche Never Die (1991), Hannah stuck to the short story genre for the rest of the decade, first with Bats Out of Hell (1993) and then with High Lonesome (1996), which was nominated for the Pulitzer Prize in fiction. After a near-fatal bout with colon cancer, Hannah returned in 2001 with Yonder Stands Your Orphan, his longest novel since Geronimo Rex. The title is taken from Bob Dylan's song "It's All Over Now, Baby Blue."

Related Topics:
William Faulkner - National Book Award - Pulitzer Prize - Fiction - Bob Dylan

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Hannah has taught creative writing at Clemson University, Middlebury College, the University of Alabama, the University of Memphis,and he currently resides in Oxford, Mississippi, where he is the director of the MFA program in creative writing for prose fiction at the University of Mississippi.

Related Topics:
Clemson University - Middlebury College - University of Alabama - University of Memphis - Oxford, Mississippi - MFA - University of Mississippi

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