Frederick Barthelme


Fredrick Barthelme is an American novelist and short story writer of minimalist fiction. He is the director of the Center For Writers at The University of Southern Mississippi and editor of ''New World Writing''

Early life

Frederick Barthelme was born on October 10, 1943, in Houston, Texas. In the 1960s, he studied at University of St. Thomas, Tulane University, the University of Houston, the Houston Museum of Fine Arts and Johns Hopkins University.

Career

Barthelme was a founding member of the Texan experimental rock band Red Krayola. In August 1967, he left the band to pursue writing and conceptual art in New York, working for a brief period as an assistant to the director of the Kornblee Gallery.
In November 1967, he showcased the conceptual art piece "untitled" at a New York art gallery and later several other pieces between 1968 and 1970, as well as some pieces in Art-Language, his works were later published in the book "Six Years: The Dematerialization of the Art Object".
His writing focuses on the landscape of the New South. Along with being a minimalist, his work has also been described as "dirty realism" and "Kmart realism". He published his first short story in The New Yorker.
Barthelme was the editor of Mississippi Review for three years. He is a teacher and the director of the Center For Writers at The University of Southern Mississippi and editor of New World Writing.

Personal life

His brothers Donald Barthelme and Steven Barthelme are also writers.

Conceptual artwork

Publications

Novels

  • War and War, 1971.
  • Second Marriage New York: Simon & Schuster, 1984.
  • Tracer New York: Simon & Schuster, 1985.
  • Two Against One New York: Weidenfeld & Nicolson, 1988.
  • Natural Selection New York: Viking, 1989.
  • The Brothers New York: Viking, 1993.
  • Painted Desert New York: Viking, 1995.
  • Bob the Gambler Boston: Houghton-Mifflin, 1997.
  • Elroy Nights Cambridge: Counterpoint, 2003.
  • Waveland New York: Doubleday, 2009.
  • There Must Be Some Mistake New York: Little Brown, 2014.

    Story collections

  • Rangoon 1970.
  • Moon Deluxe Simon & Schuster, 1983.
  • Chroma Simon & Schuster, 1987.
  • The Law of Averages: New & Selected Stories Counterpoint, 2000.
  • "trip" photographs by Susan Lipper Powerhouse Books, 1998.

    Memoirs

  • Double Down: Reflections on Gambling and Loss. Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1999.

    Screenplays

  • Second Marriage 1985.
  • Tracer 1986.

    Awards

  • 1976–77 Eliot Coleman Award for prose from Johns Hopkins University for his short story, "Storyteller"
  • 1979, 1980 National Endowment for the Arts grant
  • 2004 PEN/Faulkner Award for Fiction nomination for Elroy Nights
  • 2010 Mississippi Institute of Arts and Letters fiction award for ''Waveland''