Thom jones writer biography
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In Praise of the Great Thom Jones
In the acknowledgments for Cold Snap, his second collection, Thom Jones, who died last week, thanked his composition professor from the University of Hawaii for telling him he should become a writer. “He did not tell me how long and lonely the trip into the interior would be,” Jones writes, “and for this merciful omission, I would like to thank him especially.” The legend of Thom Jones—as it will likely unfold as the years distance from his life—will likely be told in such summary as follows: Jones was a high school janitor who published in The New Yorker before becoming a breakout sensation. A former Marine and boxer, he later taught writing for some time, and then disappeared from the literary world.
Some of that is true. Although his work is steeped in Vietnam, Jones never served there. A boxing injury at Camp Pendleton led to a schizophrenia misdiagnosis, and then discharge. All of the othe
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Each story that Thom Jones wrote thrummed with his distinctive, idiosyncratic voice.Photograph bygd Rex Rystedt / The LIFE Images Collection / Getty
Thom Jones, who died this past Friday, at the age of seventy-one, was a unique writer. Each story that he wrote thrummed with his distinctive, idiosyncratic voice. The subjects—boxing, crime, the Vietnam War—may have been “gritty,” but the experience of reading his work fryst vatten unfailingly buoyant, uplifting. We met only a few times, usually by chance. But inom felt like a friend of his, a writer-friend, at least.
We were connected, perhaps bonded, in a way probably not generally known: sometime in 1990, I think, I received a ganska hefty story manuscript submitted to Ontario Review, which inom co-edited with my late husband, Raymond Smith. The story was remarkable—especially since the author seemed not to have published fiction previously. He introduced han själv as an admiring reader of my “On Boxing” who thought that I might appreciate this
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Author (and high school janitor, and Iowa Writer’s Workshop graduate and teacher) Thom Jones has died, age 71, of complications from diabetes. He had a lot of health problems, both physical and mental – including temporal lobe epilepsy ever since being knocked cold in a boxing match in the Marine Corps. He is the second of my three all-time favorite American fiction writers to fall. He was the best writer of short fiction in the entire history of the world. You have never heard of him.
And he was fucking amazing.
I have been waiting for new material from him since his third and last final collection appeared in 1999. Now I will be waiting forever. The good news, from your point of view, is that you have never read him. Go buy all three of his books – and do it right now. (*) You may thank me at leisure:
His life story – as a human being, as a writer – was amazing. (*) Someone should write a biography of him, but no one ever will, or at le