Minneapolis writer Charles Baxter has been awarded the Rea Award for the Short Story, a significant literary prize that has gone previously to John Updike, Ann Beattie, Grace Paley and Richard Ford.
Baxter is the author of five novels, including "The Feast of Love," and six collections of short stories, including the recent "Grphyon: New and Selected." he is the Edelstein-Keller Professor of Creative Writing at the University of Minnesota and also teaches in the MFA program at Warren Wilson College. He was born in Minneapolis and graduated from Macalester College in St. Paul.
The Rea Award carries a $30,000 honorarium and recognizes a living U.S. or Canadian writer who has, in the words of founder Michael M. Rea, "made a significant contribution to the discipline of the short story as an art form." Baxter, the jurors said, is "a writer of elegant sentences, an expert in the mechanics of dramatic narration, and a master of psychological exile."
The award was judged this year by Lorrie Moore, Bill Henderson and Stuart Dybek.
