John irving biography
John Irving published his first novel at the age of His fourth novel, The World According to Garp, won the National Book Award in His screenplay adaptation of another one of his novels, The Cider House Rules, won him an Academy Award. Millions of copies of his novels and short stories have been printed, sold, and read worldwide.
You would imagine that words would come easy to a tremendously talented and skilled master storyteller such as John Irving. But for Irving this was not the case. Writing was not automatic, but he has made it work for him. &#;To do anything really well, you have to overextend yourself,&#; Irving observes. &#;In my case, I learned that I just had to pay twice as much attention. I came to appreciate that in doing something over and over again, something that was never natural becomes almost second nature. You learn that you have the capacity for that, and that it doesn’t come overnight.&#;
As a student at Phillips Exeter Academy, a prep school in New England where his stepfather taught, he worked hard to earn C-minuses in English, and except for a rare few who saw sparks of his potential, his teachers regarded him as &#;lazy&#; and &#;stupid.&#; Irving remarks on those times during the late ’s and early ’s in an interview for Dr. Sally Shaywitz’s book, Overcoming Dyslexia.
I simply accepted the conventional wisdom of the day—I was a struggling student; therefore, I was stupid.
I needed five years to past the three-year foreign language requirement…I passed Latin I with a D, and flunked Latin II; then I switched to Spanish, which I barely survived…
It wasn’t until my younger son, Brendan, was diagnosed as slightly dyslexic that I realized how I had been given the shaft. His teachers said that Brendan comprehended everything he read, but that he didn’t comprehend a text as quickly as his peers….As a child, Brendan read with his finger following the sentences—as I read, as I still read. Unless I’ve written it, I read Born John Wallace Blunt, Jr., March 2, , in Exeter, NH; son of Colin F. N. (a teacher) and Frances (Winslow) Irving; married Shyla Leary, August 20, (divorced, ); married Janet Turnbull, June 6, ; children: (first marriage) Colin, Brendan, (second marriage) Everett. Education: University of New Hampshire, B.A. (cum laude), ; University of Iowa, M.F.A., ; additional study at University of Pittsburgh, , and University of Vienna, Home—Dorset, VT; and Toronto, Ontario, Canada. Agent—c/o Author Mail, Random House, East 50th St., New York, NY Novelist. Windham College, assistant professor of English, , ; University of Iowa, Iowa City, writer-in-residence, ; Mount Holyoke College, South Hadley, MA, assistant professor of English, ; Brandeis University, assistant professor of English, Teacher and reader at Bread Loaf Writers Conference, Phillips Exeter Academy, NH, assistant wrestling coach, ; Northfield Mt. Hermon School, assistant wrestling coach, , Fessenden School, assistant wrestling coach, , Vermont Academy, head wrestling coach, Rockefeller Foundation grant, ; National Endowment for the Arts fellowship, ; Guggenheim fellow, ; National Book Award nomination, , and American Book Award, , both for The World according to Garp; named among ten "Good Guys" honored for contributions furthering advancement of women, National Women's Political Caucus, , for The Cider House Rules; Academy Award for screenplay based on material previously produced or published, , for The Cider House Rules. Setting Free the Bears (also see below), Random House (New York, NY), The Water-Method Man (also see below), Random House (New York, NY), The Pound Marriage (also see below), Random House (New York, NY), The World according to Garp, Dutton (New York, NY), Three by Irving (contains Setting Free the Bears, The Water-Method Man, and The Pound Marriage), Random House (New York, NY), American-Canadian novelist and screenwriter (born ) For other people named John Irving, see John Irving (disambiguation). John Winslow Irving (born John Wallace Blunt Jr.; March 2, ) is an American-Canadiannovelist, short story writer, and screenwriter. Irving achieved critical and popular acclaim after the international success of The World According to Garp in Many of Irving's novels, including The Hotel New Hampshire (), The Cider House Rules (), A Prayer for Owen Meany (), and A Widow for One Year (), have been bestsellers. He won the Academy Award for Best Adapted Screenplay at the 72nd Academy Awards for his script of the film adaptation ofThe Cider House Rules. Five of his novels have been adapted into films (Garp, HotelNew Hampshire, Owen Meany, Cider House, and Widow for One Year). Several of Irving's books and short stories have been set in and around New England, in fictional towns resembling Exeter, New Hampshire. Irving was born John Wallace Blunt Jr. in Exeter, New Hampshire, the son of Helen Frances (née Winslow) and John Wallace Blunt Sr., a writer and executive recruiter; the couple separated during pregnancy. Irving was raised by his mother and stepfather, Colin Franklin Newell Irving, who was a Phillips Exeter Academy faculty member. His uncle Hammy Bissell was also part of the faculty. John Irving was in the Phillips Exeter wrestling program as a student athlete and as an assistant coach, and wrestling features prominently in his books, stories, and life. While a student at Exeter, Irving was taught by author and Christian theologian Frederick Buechner, whom he quoted in an epigraph in A Prayer for Owen Meany. Irving has dyslexia. Irving never met his biological father, who was a pilot in the Army Air Forces during World War II. In July , John Blunt Sr. was shot down over Bur John Winslow Irving (born John Wallace Blunt Jr.; March 2, ) is an American-Canadiannovelist, short story writer, and screenwriter. Irving was born in Exeter, New Hampshire. His parents divorced before he was born. His name was changed when his mother married again. His step-father was a teacher at Phillips Exeter Academy. When he graduated from there, Irving went to the University of Pittsburgh. After one year there, he went to study in Vienna, Austria. He came back to the United States to study at the University of Iowa Writers' Workshop. One of his teachers there was Kurt Vonnegut, Jr.. In Iowa, he wrote his first novel, Setting Free the Bears. He became well-known in when The World According to Garp came out. It was a finalist for the National Book Award for Fiction in In he won an Academy Award for his screenplay of his novel The Cider House Rules. In , he won the Richard C. Holbrooke Distinguished Achievement Award. Irving, John
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