Charles Bowden


Charles Clyde Bowden was an American non-fiction author, journalist and essayist based in Las Cruces, New Mexico. He was best known for his work documenting violence on the Mexico-United States border, especially in and around Ciudad Juarez.

Early life and education

Bowden was born on July 20, 1945, in Joliet, Illinois, and grew up first in Chicago and later in Tucson, Arizona. He attended Tucson High School, the University of Arizona, and the University of Wisconsin, where he obtained his master's degree in American intellectual history; while there he walked out as he was defending his dissertation for his doctorate, annoyed by the questions asked him by the review committee.

Career

Bowden was a writer for the Tucson Citizen and often wrote about the American Southwest. He was a contributing editor of GQ and Mother Jones magazine, and he wrote for other periodicals, including Harper's Magazine, The [New York Times Book Review], Esquire, High Country News, and Aperture.
Bowden was the winner of the 1996 Lannan Literary Award for Nonfiction, the PEN Center USA’s First Amendment Award in 2011, and a 2010 award from United States Artists. He was known for his writings on the situation at the US–Mexico border and wrote often about the effects of the war on drugs on the lives of the people in that region. Earlier in his career his writings focused more on environmental issues, the beauty of nature, and sustainability challenges.

Personal life and death

Bowden was married and divorced twice, and had long-term relationships and professional partnerships with writer Mary Martha Miles and research librarian Molly Molloy. He died in Las Cruces, New Mexico, on August 30, 2014, after a brief illness. He was survived by his son and two siblings. He left a number of manuscripts that are being published posthumously by The Bowden Publishing Project, which is also reissuing some of his earlier books. His work and life were the subject of the Spring 2019 special issue of Journal of the Southwest, and a related book, America's Most Alarming Writer: Essays on the Life and Work of Charles Bowden.

Selected works

  • The Impact of Energy Development on Water Resources in Arid Lands: Literature Review and Annotated Bibliography
  • Killing the Hidden Waters
  • Street Signs Chicago: Neighborhood and Other Illusions of Big City Life / text by Charles Bowden and Lew Kreinberg; photographs by Richard Younker; foreword by William Appleman Williams
  • Blue Desert
  • Frog Mountain Blues / text by Charles Bowden; photographs by Jack W. Dykinga
  • Trust Me: Charles Keating and the Missing Billions / text by Charles Bowden and Michael Binstein
  • Mezcal
  • Red Line
  • Desierto: Memories of the Future
  • The Sonoran Desert / photographs by Jack W. Dykinga; text by Charles Bowden
  • The Secret Forest / text by Charles Bowden; photographs by Jack W. Dykinga; introduction by Paul S. Martin
  • Seasons of the Coyote: the Legend and Lore of an American Icon / essays by Charles Bowden, et al
  • Frog Mountain Blues; photographs by Jack W. Dykinga; with a new afterword by the author
  • Blood Orchid: An Unnatural History of America
  • Chihuahua: Pictures From the Edge / photographs by Virgil Hancock; essay by Charles Bowden
  • Stone Canyons of the Colorado Plateau / photographs by Jack W. Dykinga; text by Charles Bowden
  • The Sierra Pinacate / Julian D. Hayden; photographs by Jack Dykinga; essays by Charles Bowden and Bernard L. Fontana
  • Juárez: The Laboratory of our Future / text by Charles Bowden; preface by Noam Chomsky; afterword by Eduardo Galeano
  • Torch Song
  • Paul Dickerson, 1961–1997 / essay by Charles Bowden
  • Eugene Richards
  • Down by the River: Drugs, Money, Murder, and Family
  • Blues for Cannibals: The Notes from Underground
  • Killing the Hidden Waters / with a new introduction by the author
  • A Shadow in the City : Confessions of an Undercover Drug Warrior
  • Sometimes a Great Notion / text by Ken Kesey; introduction by Charles Bowden, pp. xiii–xix
  • Kill the Messenger: How the CIA's Crack-Cocaine Controversy Destroyed Journalist Gary Webb / text by Nick Schou; preface by Charles Bowden
  • Inferno / text by Charles Bowden; photographs by Michael P. Berman Winner of the Border [Regional Library Association|Border Regional Library Association's] Southwest Book Award
  • Exodus/Éxodo / text by Charles Bowden, photographs by Julián Cardona
  • Trinity
  • Some of the Dead are Still Breathing: Living in the Future
  • The Charles Bowden Reader
  • Dreamland: The Way Out of Juárez / text by Charles Bowden; illustrations by Alice Leora Briggs
  • Murder City: Ciudad Juárez and the Global Economy's New Killing Fields / text by Charles Bowden; photographs by Julián Cardona
  • El Sicario: The Autobiography of a Mexican Assassin / co-editors Molly Molloy and Charles Bowden
  • Dead When I Got Here: Asylum from the Madness ; Executive Producer of documentary in collaboration with Director/Producer Mark Aitken –
  • Some of the Dead Are Still Breathing: Living in the Future
  • Dakotah: The Return of the Future
  • Jericho
  • The Red Caddy: Into the Unknown with Edward Abbey
  • ''Sonata''

    Archival sources

  • 1947–2007 are housed at the Wittliff Collections, Texas State University in San Marcos.