Books by Richard Bausch
Wives & Lovers: Three Short Novels
“A first-rate collection of novellas that will break your heart and fill you with hope at the same time.” —Denver Rocky Mountain News
In the tradition of William Faulkner and Gabriel Garcia Marquez comes Wives and Lovers, from the author the Boston Globe calls “One of the most expert and substantial of our writers.”
Requisite Kindness—published here for the first time—tells the story of a man who must comes to terms with a life of treating women badly when he goes to live with his sister and dying mother. Rare and Endangered Species demonstrates how a wife and mother’s suicide reverberates in the small community where she lives, and affects the lives of people who don’t even know her. Finally, Spirits is about the pain that men and women can—and do—inflict upon each other. Three very different stories that illuminate the unadorned core of love—not the showy, more celebrated sort, but what remains when the more ephemeral emotions such as lust, jealousy, and passion have been stripped away.
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Hello to the Cannibals: A Novel
At first, all Lily Austin knows about 19th–century explorer Mary Kingsley is that, 100 years before, she was the first white woman to venture into the heart of Africa. But as Lily begins reading about Mary Kingsley, she becomes more and more fascinated – and discovers in Mary a kindred spirit.
In her own life, Lily feels trapped – on the one hand, she craves family and intimate connection; on the other hand, she has no healthy or satisfying role models. Consequently, as she nears graduation from the University of Virginia, she finds herself uncertain about what to do with her life.
As she researches Mary's life – she has begun writing a play about her – Lily comes to witness Mary's incredible bravery and startling originality, qualities that prove inspirational to Lily, whose own bravery is required as she attempts to navigate dysfunctional and destructive relationships with her young husband, her extended family – and a legacy of abuse dating back to her childhood.
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Someone to Watch Over Me: Stories
"The essential mystery at the heart of every relationship is the subject of these twelve stories. What drives people together? What drives them apart? Revenge, boredom, sex—they're all here. . . . The landscape of the heart depicted here is less bleak than it sounds; what drives these stories is the belief that love is reachable just around the bend." —Entertainment Weekly
Richard Bausch is a master of the intimate moment, of the ways we seek to make lasting connections to one another and to the world. Few writers evoke the complexities of love as subtly, and few capture the poignancy of the sudden insight or the rhythms of ordinary conversation with such delicacy and humor. To read these twelve stories—of love and loss, of families and strangers, of small moments and enormous epiphanies—is to be reminded again of the power of short fiction to thrill and move us, to make us laugh, or cry. In these profound glimpses into the private fears, joys, and sorrows of people we know, we find revealed a whole range of human experience, told with extraordinary force, clarity, and compassion.
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$15.99
Good Evening Mr. and Mrs. America, and All the Ships at Sea: Novel, A
The critics have been effusive in their praise for Richard Bausch's Good Evening Mr. and Mrs. America and All the Ships at Sea.His hardover sales have also never been higher. Taking its title from Walter Winchell's famous radio salutation, Good Evening Mr. and Mrs. America opens in Washington, DC, in 1964, just after the Kennedy assassination, telling the story of Walter Marshall, an idealistic 19-year-old who lives with his widowed mother and studies to be a journalist like his hero, Edward R. Murrow. In this coming-of-age novel in the truest sense of the phrase, young Marshall fumbles toward manhood in a nation that is itself in the midst of cataclysmic change.
With the same elegance and precision that has distinguished his other novels, Richard Bausch has evoked a sense of time and place in a different America and brings the last 30 years of history profoundly and vividly to life.
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The Stories of Richard Bausch
A 2004 PEN/Malamud Award winner, this collection celebrates the work of American artist Richard Bausch -- a writer the New York Times calls "a master of the short story." By turns tender, raw, heartbreaking, and riotously funny, the many voices of this definitive forty-two-story collection (seven of which appear here for the first time) defy expectation, attest to Bausch's remarkable range and versatility, and affirm his place alongside such acclaimed story writers as John Cheever, Flannery O'Connor, Raymond Carver, and Grace Paley.
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$16.99
Something Is Out There: Stories
From the prizewinning novelist and world-renowned short-story writer, the author of 2008’s universally acclaimed novel Peace (“A brilliant one-act drama depicting the futility and moral complexity of combat” —The New York Times), eleven indelible new tales that showcase the electrifying artistry of a master.
A husband confronts the power of youth and the inexorable truths of old age. A son sits by his mother’s bedside determined to give her what she needs in her final days, even though doing so means breaking his own heart. A brief adulterous tryst illuminates the fragility of our most intimate relations. A young man returns in the face of crisis to the parents he once rejected. A divorced young woman dealing with slowly increasing despair develops an obsesion about a note that fell from the pocket of a man who came to eat in the café where she works. A wife whose husband has been shot must weather a terrible snowstorm with her two sons, as well as a storm of doubt about the extent of his involvement in a crime.
Richard Bausch’s stories contend with transfixing themes: marital and familial estrangement, ways of trespass, the intractable mysteries and frights of daily life in these times, the uncertainty of knowledge and truth, the gulfs between friends and lovers, the frailty of even the most abiding love—while underlining throughout the persistence of love, the obdurate forces that connect us. His consummate skill, penetrating wit, and unfailing emotional generosity are on glorious display in this fine new collection.
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Peace
by Tucker Shaw, Richard Bausch, Wendy Anderson Halperin
Discusses past and present peace leaders and movements alongside quotes about peace from around the world, with a focus on the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001.
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Peace
by Tucker Shaw, Richard Bausch, Wendy Anderson Halperin
From the prize-winning novelist and world-renowned short story writer, recipient of the PEN/Malamud Award and the Academy Award from the Academy of Arts and Letters, a powerful novel about war, trust, and salvation that begs to be read in a single sitting.
Italy, near Cassino. The terrible winter of 1944. A dismal icy rain, continuing unabated for days. Guided by a seventy-year-old Italian man in rope-soled shoes, three American soldiers are sent on a reconnaissance mission up the side of a steep hill that they discover, before very long, to be a mountain. And the old man’s indeterminate loyalties only add to the terror and confusion that engulf them on that mountain, where they are confronted with the horror of their own time—and then set upon by a sniper.
Taut and propulsive—with its spare language, its punishing landscape, and the keenly drawn portraits of the three young soldiers at its center—Peace is a feat of economy, compression, and imagination, a brutal and unmistakably contemporary meditation on the corrosiveness of violence, the human cost of war, and the redemptive power of mercy.
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Peace
by Tucker Shaw, Richard Bausch, Wendy Anderson Halperin
This lavish and lyrical picture book based on the Tao Te Ching ponders the eternal question: How can we bring peace to the world?
Radiating tenderness and reflecting the influence of eastern philosophies, a compilation of exquisite illustrations and wisely chosen words reveals the heart of where peace truly must originate: within ourselves. The beautifully intricate artwork, with tiny, precisely rendered details of life across the globe, complements the spare and powerful text that includes quotations from famous peacemakers. And with each reading, you’ll find something else to notice—such as the visual storylines that subtly play out across the pages.
Poetic and soothing, Peace is a masterful exploration of the true path to world peace and serves as a perfect springboard to discussions about bullying, conflict resolution, and right actions.
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Before, During, After
From the recipient of the PEN/Malamud Award, the Literature Award from the American Academy of Arts and Letters, and the Rea Award for the Short Story: a gorgeously rendered, passionate account of a relationship threatened by secrets, set against the backdrop of national tragedy.
When Natasha, a talented young artist working as a congressional aide, meets Michael Faulk, an Episcopalian priest struggling with his faith, the stars seem to align. Although he is nearly two decades older, they discover in each other the happy yearning and exhilaration of lovers, and within months they are engaged. Shortly before their wedding, while Natasha is vacationing in Jamaica and Faulk is in New York attending the wedding of a family friend, the terrorist attacks of September 11 shatter the tranquillity of the nation’s summer. Alone in a state of abject terror, cut off from America and convinced that Faulk is dead, Natasha makes an error in judgment that leads to a private trauma of her own on the Caribbean shore. A few days later, she and Faulk are reunited, but the horror of that day and Natasha’s inability to speak of it inexorably divide their relationship into “before” and “after.” They move to Memphis and begin their new life together, but their marriage quickly descends into repression, anxiety, and suspicion.
In prose that is direct, exact, and lyrical, Richard Bausch plumbs the complexities of public and personal trauma, and the courage with which we learn to face them. Above all, Before, During, After is a love story, offering a penetrating and exquisite portrait of intimacy, of spiritual and physical longing, and of the secrets we convince ourselves to keep even as they threaten to destroy us. An unforgettable tour de force from one of America’s most distinguished storytellers.
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Something Is Out There: Stories (Vintage Contemporaries)
In these eleven unforgettable stories, Richard Bausch plumbs the depths of familial and marital estrangement, the gulfs between friends and lovers,the fragility and impermanence of love—and manages to find something quite surprising: human hope.
Bausch’s assured style, signature grace, and penetrating wit shine on every page, confirming his stature as one of America’s most beloved and acclaimed writers.
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Before, During, After (Vintage Contemporaries)
Although they are separated in age by almost two decades, when Natasha, a young artist, meets Michael Faulk, a priest struggling with his faith, the stars seem to align. But shortly before their wedding day, as the terrorist attacks of 9/11 shake the country, cracks in their relationship begin to emerge. Cut off from one another for several terrifying hours, Natasha suffers an unimaginable private trauma, and her inability to speak of it inexorably divides their relationship into “before” and “after.” Gorgeously rendered and emotionally powerful, in Before, During, After one of our most distinguished storytellers charts the path of a relationship threatened by secrets.
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Peace (Vintage Contemporaries)
This "small masterpiece with the same emotional force and moral complexity as Conrad’s Heart of Darkness and Tolstoy’s Hadji Murad” (Colm Tóibín) inspired the film Recon.
Italy, near Cassino, in the terrible winter of 1944. An icy rain, continuing unabated for days. Guided by a seventy-year-old Italian man in rope-soled shoes, three American soldiers are sent on a reconnaissance mission up the side of a steep hill that they discover, before very long, to be a mountain.
As they climb, the old man's indeterminate loyalties only add to the terror and confusion that engulf them. Peace is a feat of storytelling from one of America's most acclaimed novelists: a powerful look at the corrosiveness of violence, the human cost of war, and the redemptive power of mercy.
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Playhouse: A novel
From the prize-winning fiction writer Richard Bausch (“A master of the novel as well as the story . . . Effortlessly engaging” —Sven Birkerts, The New York Times), a sharp, affecting, masterly new novel about a close-knit theater community in Memphis and one turbulent, transformative production of King Lear.
As renovations begin at the Shakespeare Theater of Memphis, life for the core members of the company seems to be falling into disarray. Their trusted director has just retired, and theater manager Thaddeus Deerforth—staring down forty and sensing a rift growing slowly between himself and his wife, Gina—dreads the arrival of an imperious, inscrutable visiting director. Claudette, struggling to make ends meet as an actor and destabilized by family troubles, is getting frequent calls from her ex-boyfriend—and also the narcissistic, lecherous television actor who has been recruited to play King Lear in their fall production.
Also invited to the cast is Malcolm Ruark, a disgraced TV anchor muddling through the fallout of a scandal involving his underaged niece—and suddenly in an even more precarious situation when the same niece, now eighteen, is cast to play Cordelia. As tensions onstage and off build toward a breaking point, the bonds among the intimately drawn characters are put to extraordinary tests—and the fate of the theater itself may even be on the line.
Deftly weaving together the points of view of Thaddeus, Claudette, and Malcolm, and utterly original in its incorporation of Shakespeare’s timeless drama, Playhouse is an unforgettable story of men and women, human frailty, art, and redemption—a work of inimitable imaginative prowess by one of our most renowned storytellers.
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Living in the Weather of the World: Stories
In these fourteen indelible stories, Richard Bausch once again proves himself a modern master.
From the prize-winning novelist and universally acclaimed short story writer ("Richard Bausch is a master of the short story" --The New York Times Book Review), thirteen unforgettable tales that showcase his electrifying artistry.
Bausch plumbs the depths of familial and marital estrangement, the violence of suicide and despair, the gulfs between friends and lovers, the complexities of divorce and infidelity, the fragility and impermanence of love. Wherever he casts his gaze, he illuminates the darkest corners of human experience with the bright light of wisdom and compassion, finding grace and redemption amidst sorrow and regret. Bausch's stories are simply extraordinary.
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The Fate of Others: Stories
A new collection of short stories examining the extraordinary shades of ordinary life, from the prize-winning fiction writer Richard Bausch (“A master of the short story" —The New York Times Book Review)
In ten piercing new stories, Richard Bausch fleshes out the rich inner worlds of his characters and plumbs the nuances of infidelity, loss, and profound loneliness. In “Donnaiolo,” a young divorcé moves back into her childhood home, with no plans other than to eat her parents’ food and smoke cigarettes in her room. In “Isolation,” a woman pines for her lover while quarantining from the COVID-19 pandemic with her husband, a situation that deteriorates when she learns her beloved has fallen gravely ill. In “Broken Home,” a Catholic school field trip takes a violent turn when the unsupervised altar boys discover an abandoned house in the woods. And in “The Widow’s Tale,” a recent widow attends a séance after her sister reports having reoccurring dreams about her late husband.
Throughout The Fate of Others, Bausch illuminates the tender, comic, and profound facets of the human condition, affirming once again his status as a modern master of the short story form.
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These Extremes: Poems and Prose (Southern Messenger Poets)
In his first collection of poetry and prose, award-winning fiction writer Richard Bausch proves that he is also an accomplished poet. Penned over a span of many years, the poems in These Extremes deal with a wide variety of subjects. Many focus on Bausch's own family and relationships. In one long, touching poem, "Barbara (1943--1974)," the poet memorializes his oldest sister, who died young. He also offers two prose memory pieces, recollections from his childhood and adolescence. In these brief "essays," Bausch draws loving but unsentimental portraits of his father, mother, and other relatives as he reflects on the sense of belonging that he gained from his family -- something he hopes to pass on to his own children in this violent, chaotic world.
In "Back Stories," the center of the book, Bausch effortlessly weaves poems around familiar characters from history, literature, movies, and popular culture -- including Thomas Jefferson, Shakespeare's Falstaff, Nurse Ratched from One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest, and Sam, the piano player from Casablanca. Decidedly accessible in form, theme, and expression, These Extremes will surprise and delight lovers of poetry and fans of Bausch's stories and novels.
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Living in the Weather of the World: Stories (Vintage Contemporaries)
In stories by turns suspenseful, comic, subtle, and profound, Richard Bausch probes the fault lines of daily life. At three in the morning a man tries not to wake his sleeping wife while fielding calls from his suicidal mistress. A successful real estate agent with two grown sons tries an online dating service on a whim and is surprised by the complicated result. And after being held up at gunpoint, a police officer commiserates with his assailant about their unhappy marriages. Wherever he casts his gaze, Bausch illuminates shades of human experience that defy understanding.
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The Norton Anthology of Short Fiction
by Richard Bausch, Ronald Verlin Cassill
Introductory matter includes a chronological list of the stories and a section on the elements of fiction. Then follow examples of short fiction arranged in alphabetical order by authors that include Welty, William Carlos Williams, Melville, de Maupassant, David Leavitt, Louise Erdrich, and Thom Jones. The last section, "Writers on Writing," features 15 valuable commentaries on the way writers read particular works of fiction: Andrea Barrett reads Willa Cather's "Paul's Case"; Gina Berriault, Ivan Bunin's "The Gentleman from San Francisco"; and Richard Ford, Bharati Mukherjee's "The Management of Grief," to name just three. In all, there are 44 stories written after 1980, 26 new to the 6th edition. A glossary is included and an instructor's handbook is available. Annotation copyrighted by Book News Inc., Portland, OR
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The Norton Anthology of Short Fiction
by Richard Bausch, Ronald Verlin Cassill
Revised by celebrated novelist and short-fiction writer Richard Bausch, this edition continues to offer the most exciting blend of contemporary and classic short stories in a portable format. In this Shorter Seventh Edition, 72 stories by 68 authors are lightly supplemented by a general introduction, biographical notes, and essays written for the benefit of beginning writers.
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The Norton Anthology of Short Fiction
by Richard Bausch, Ronald Verlin Cassill
The Norton Anthology of Short Fiction features 152 works--many of them new to this edition--by 130 authors, offering a broad collection of short stories with the most thoughtful annotations and apparatus on the market. With a new Authors in Depth feature, an extensive Reviews and Commentaries section, and expanded coverage of Writers on Writing, the Eighth Edition provides a wealth of criticism of key works and authors, as well as the opportunity to look deeper into the craft of fiction.
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