Richard Ford
Richard Ford, born on February 16, 1944, in Jackson, Mississippi, is an influential American author known for his explorations of identity through the lens of environment and occupation. His literary career began with his debut novel, *A Piece of My Heart* (1976), and he gained critical acclaim with *The Sportswriter* (1986), which features the recurring character Frank Bascombe. Ford's writing often reflects the struggles of lower- and lower-middle-class characters, illustrating themes of financial insecurity and the impact of one's job on personal identity. Throughout his career, he has delved into various American settings, including the South, the West, and the Northeast, while highlighting the complexities of everyday life. Notable works also include *Independence Day*, which won the Pulitzer Prize, and *Canada* (2012), a bestseller. Ford's literary contributions extend beyond fiction; he has edited anthologies and taught at several prestigious institutions. As of 2024, he continues his literary journey with the release of *Be Mine*, further developing the character of Frank Bascombe in the context of contemporary challenges. Ford's work has earned him numerous accolades, including the Prize for American Fiction from the Librarian of Congress in 2019.
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Subject Terms
Richard Ford
- Born: February 16, 1944
- Birthplace: Jackson, Mississippi
Author Profile
Author Richard Ford was born in Jackson, Mississippi. This lies in the Deep South, similar to William Faulkner and Eudora Welty. His first novel, A Piece of My Heart (1976), is done in the Southern gothic tradition. Ford has also written about other parts of America. In his short stories collection Rock Springs (1987) and in the short novel Wildlife (1990), Ford writes of the American West, taking his readers to the setting of Montana. In his later works featuring the Everyman character Frank Bascombe, Ford writes about the Northeast as it changes over the course of a lifetime. Regardless of the settings of his stories, Ford's stories focus on illustrating how environment and occupation define his characters’ identities.
Ford grew up between the care of his parents and grandparents in Mississippi and Arkansas. After some teenage scrapes with the law, which, it may be said, find their expression in his stories of thieves, drifters, and losers, Ford left the South to attend college at Michigan State University. He studied hotel management before switching to English and earning his bachelor's degree in 1966. After an aborted attempt at a law degree, he obtained a master's degree in fiction writing from the University of California at Irvine in 1970. Except for several short-term teaching positions, Ford dedicated himself to working exclusively as a writer. After many of his early short stories were rejected, he began writing A Piece of My Heart in 1971, and it would finally be published in 1976. His breakthrough came ten years later, when his novel The Sportswriter (1986) brought wide critical acclaim. The same year saw the publication of his short story collection Rock Springs, which was also highly praised.
Like his best friend, the late , Ford wrote extensively about lower-and lower-middle-class characters, and how they often struggle to survive. In his short fiction, the stress of financial insecurity defined characters and eliminated options most affluent people take for granted.
Even for Ford’s more affluent characters, money is important. Ford’s calling as a writer defines him in the same way that occupations define the identities of many of his characters. Frank Bascombe, the narrator of Ford’s two best-known novels, The Sportswriter and its sequel Independence Day (1995), allows his jobs (sportswriter and realtor, respectively) to determine not only how he spends his time but also the shape of his life, thoughts, and beliefs. Independence Day won Ford both the Pulitzer Prize and the PEN/Faulkner Award in recognition of his important contributions to American literature. His novel Canada (2012) was a bestseller and well reviewed. Bascombe returned in the novel The Lay of the Land (2006) and the series of novellas Let Me Be Frank With You (2014), which showed the character as a retiree facing the later stages of life in the context of such real-world upheavals as Hurricane Sandy. He continued writing in his seventies and eighties, publishing Between Them: Remembering My Parents (2017), a memoir; Sorry for Your Trouble (2020), a collection of short stories, and Be Mine (2024), the fifth novel featuring the character Bascombe. Like , Ford shows how for many American men, a job becomes the central focus of identity, although it is also shaped by the environment they occupy.
Ford has also worked as an editor for short fiction anthologies and issues of literary magazines such as Ploughshares, TriQuarterly, and editions of the New Granta Book of the American Short Story. He has held teaching positions at the University of Michigan, Williams College, Princeton University, Bowdoin College, and the University of Mississippi. In 2019, he received the Prize for American Fiction from the Librarian of Congress, along with other honors.
Bibliography
Alcorn, Ellen. “Richard Ford: His Novels Are a Medicine against Pain.” GQ, May 1990, pp. 224–25.
Ballantyne, Sheila. “A Family Too Close to the Fire.” Review of Wildlife, by Richard Ford. New York Times Book Review, 17 June 1990, www.nytimes.com/1990/06/17/books/a-family-too-close-to-the-fire.html. Accessed 4 Oct. 2024.
Folks, Jeffrey J. “Richard Ford: Postmodern Cowboys.” Southern Writers at Century’s End, edited by Jeffrey J. Folks and James A. Perkins, UP of Kentucky, 1997.
---. “The Risks of Membership: Richard Ford’s The Sportswriter.” Mississippi Quarterly, vol. 52, no. 1, 1998, pp. 73–88.
Ford, Richard. “First Things First.” Harper’s Magazine, Aug. 1988, pp. 72–77, harpers.org/archive/1988/08/first-things-first-2/. Accessed 4 Oct. 2024.
---. “Interview.” Speaking of the Short Story: Interviews with Contemporary Writers, edited by Farhat Iftekharuddin, et al., UP of Mississippi, 1997.
---. “Interview with Richard Ford.” Interview by Matthew Gilbert. The Writer, vol. 109, 1996, pp. 9–10.
Guagliardo, Huey, editor. Perspectives on Richard Ford. UP of Mississippi, 2000.
Guinn, Matthew. After Southern Modernism: Fiction of the Contemporary South. UP of Mississippi, 2000.
Hardwick, Elizabeth. “Reckless People.” New York Review of Books, 10 Aug. 1995, www.nybooks.com/articles/1995/08/10/reckless-people/. Accessed 4 Oct. 2024. .
Johnson, Charles. “Stuck in the Here and Now.” New York Times Book Review, 18 June 1995, pp. 7–8, www.nytimes.com/1995/06/18/books/stuck-in-the-here-and-now.html. Accessed 4 Oct. 2024.
Lee, Don. “About Richard Ford.” Ploughshares, vol. 22, 1996, pp. 226–35, www.pshares.org/issues/fall-1996/about-richard-ford-profile. Accessed 4 Oct. 2024.
Manguel, Alberto. “America’s Best Novelist.” Saturday Night, vol. 105, 1990, pp. 60–61.
Nazaryan, Alexander. "Richard Ford: Heart of the Country." Newsweek, 13 Nov. 2014, www.newsweek.com/2014/11/21/richard-ford-heart-country-283957.html. Accessed 4 Oct. 2024.
"Richard Ford: 'I Don't Read for Comfort. Comfort I Source Elsewhere.'" The Guardian, 30 Jun. 2023, www.theguardian.com/books/2023/jun/30/richard-ford-i-dont-read-for-comfort-comfort-i-source-elsewhere. Accessed 4 Oct. 2024.
Schroth, R. A. “America’s Moral Landscape in the Fiction of Richard Ford.” The Christian Century, 1 Mar. 1989, pp. 227–30.