Description
Ernest J. Gaines is an acclaimed American author whose works of fiction, set in the Southern United States, are known for their authentic and vivid depiction of life in the rural south. He is best known for his novel A Lesson Before Dying, which was awarded the National Book Critics Circle Award for Fiction in 1993.
Gaines was born in 1933 in Pointe Coupee Parish, Louisiana, and grew up on the River Lake Plantation near New Roads, Louisiana. After graduating from high school, he attended Valparaiso University in Indiana on a track scholarship and later transferred to San Francisco State College. He graduated with a bachelor‘s degree in 1955.
Gaines wrote his first novel, Catherine Carmier, in 1964. He has since written several novels, including The Autobiography of Miss Jane Pittman (1971), Of Love and Dust (1967), and A Gathering of Old Men (1983). His books often focus on the struggles of African Americans living in the rural south, and explore themes of racism, identity, and family.
Gaines has received numerous awards and honors, including the American Academy of Arts and Letters Award for Literature, the National Humanities Medal presented by President Obama in 2013, and the Medal of Arts presented by President Bush in 2006. He has also served as a professor at the University of Louisiana, Lafayette and the University of Southwestern Louisiana. In 2003, the Ernest J. Gaines Center was established at the University of Louisiana, in his honor.
Gaines continues to write and lecture on writing, literature, and African American culture. His most recent book, The Tragedy at Marsden Bay, was published in 2019. His work has been praised for its realism and poignancy, and he is considered to be one of the most significant American authors of the 20th century.
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