Robert Olmstead
{{short description|American novelist and educator (born 1954)}}
{{Infobox writer
|image = RobertOlmstead01.JPG
| name = Robert Olmstead
| caption = Robert Olmstead visiting Barnes & Noble for New York book signing.
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| birth_date = {{birth date and age|1954|1|3}}
| birth_place = Westmoreland, New Hampshire, U.S.
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| occupation = Novelist
| nationality =
| alma_mater = Syracuse University
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| notableworks = Coal Black Horse
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Robert Olmstead (born January 3, 1954) is an American novelist and educator.
Early life and education
Olmstead was born in 1954 in Westmoreland, New Hampshire. He grew up on a farm. After high school, he enrolled at Davidson College with a football scholarship, but left school after three semesters in which he compiled a poor academic record.David Marc, [http://sumagazine.syr.edu/archive/summer08/alumnijournal/index.html Robert Olmstead ’77, G’83; Telling Stories], Syracuse University Magazine, Volume 25, Number 2, Summer 2008 He later attended Syracuse University, where he studied with Raymond Carver and Tobias Wolff and received both bachelor's and master's degrees, in 1977 and 1983, respectively.
Career
He was the former Director of Creative Writing at Ohio Wesleyan University and now serves as an emeritus faculty member at the university.{{cite web|url = https://www.owu.edu/academics/departments-programs/department-of-english/faculty-and-staff/robert-m-olmstead/|title = Robert M. Olmstead (faculty biography)|publisher = owu.edu|access-date = December 30, 2020}} He has also served as the Senior Writer in Residence at Dickinson College and as the director of creative writing at Boise State University.{{cite web|url = http://english.owu.edu/olmstead.html|title = Department of English: Robert Olmstead|publisher = owu.edu|access-date = November 1, 2010}} Olmstead teaches in the Low-Residency MFA program in creative writing at Converse College.
Olmstead is the author of the novels America by Land, A Trail of Heart's Blood Wherever We Go, Soft Water, Far Bright Star and Coal Black Horse. He is also the author of a memoir Stay Here With Me, as well as River Dogs, a collection of short stories, and the textbook Elements of the Writing Craft.{{cite web|url = http://experts.owu.edu/expertSourceGuide/experts/olmsteadRobert.html|title = Expert Source: Robert M. Olmstead, M.A.|publisher = owu.edu|access-date = November 1, 2010}} He was the recipient of a Guggenheim Fellowship in 1989{{cite news|title = Novelist Carolyn See Wins a Guggenheim Fellowship|author = Miles, J.|date = April 17, 1989|newspaper = Los Angeles Times|url = https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-1989-04-17-vw-2055-story.html|access-date = November 1, 2010}} and an NEA Literature Fellowship in 1993.{{cite web|url = http://www.nea.gov/pub/nea_lit.pdf|title = NEA Literature Fellowships|publisher = nea.gov|date = March 2006|access-date = November 1, 2010|page = 33|url-status = dead|archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20090710213735/http://www.nea.gov/pub/nea_lit.pdf|archive-date = July 10, 2009}}
His novel Coal Black Horse (2007) has received national acclaim, including the 2007 Chicago Tribune Heartland Prize for Fiction and the 2008 Ohioana Book Award for Fiction; it was also selected for the "On the Same Page Cincinnati" reading program and the Choose to Read Ohio’s 2011 booklist.{{cite web|url = http://connect2.owu.edu/issues/20100603/newsAndViews/olmstead.html|title = Robert Olmstead's Coal Black Horse Gallops Toward New Recognition|author = Hirsch, G.|publisher = owu.edu|date = June 3, 2010|access-date = November 1, 2010}}
Booklist has named his novel Far Bright Star (2009) (the second book in the Coal Black Horse trilogy) as one of the Top Ten Westerns of the Decade; the book also received the 2010 Western Writers of America Spur Award.{{cite web|url = http://connect2.owu.edu/issues/20101021/ourTown/olmstead.html|title = Another Olmstead Book Honored|author = Hirsch, G.|publisher = owu.edu|date = October 21, 2010|access-date = November 1, 2010}} One reviewer praised Olmstead's ability to "translate nature's revelatory beauty into words", commenting that Coal Black Horse evokes what Henry David Thoreau described in Walden as "the indescribable innocence and beneficence of Nature"; by contrast, the Mexican desert of Far Bright Star is "the place of the sun shriveled and the dried up".{{cite news|title = Bloody 'Far Bright Star' finds clarity in the Mexican desert|author = Turakhia, V.|date = May 9, 2009|newspaper = Milwaukee Journal Sentinel|url = http://www.jsonline.com/entertainment/arts/44558577.html|access-date = November 9, 2010}} The Chicago Tribune review praised the authenticity of the imagery and experiences in Olmstead's writing, while also comparing his writing to that of Ernest Hemingway. It noted the influence of contemporary events, such as the guerrilla warfare during the U.S. occupation of Fallujah during the Iraq War.{{cite news|title = 'Far Bright Star' feels like Hemingway|author = Mabe, C.|date = June 20, 2009|newspaper = Chicago Tribune|url = http://articles.chicagotribune.com/2009-06-20/news/0906190188_1_robert-olmstead-hemingway-coal-black-horse|archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20120723075932/http://articles.chicagotribune.com/2009-06-20/news/0906190188_1_robert-olmstead-hemingway-coal-black-horse|url-status = dead|archive-date = July 23, 2012|access-date = November 9, 2010}}
Works
References
{{Reflist}}
External links
{{wikiquote}}
- [http://www.algonquin.com/authors/robert_olmstead/ Algonquin Books' Robert Olmstead web pages]
- [http://www.kboo.fm/node/16352 Robert Olmstead on His Life as a Writer] (audio of KBOO Community Radio interview, August 27, 2009)
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Category:20th-century American novelists
Category:21st-century American novelists
Category:American male novelists
Category:Ohio Wesleyan University faculty
Category:Syracuse University alumni
Category:Novelists from New Hampshire
Category:20th-century American male writers