Andre Dubus | |
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| Born | Andre Jules Dubus II (1936-08-11)August 11, 1936 Lake Charles, Louisiana, United States |
| Died | February 24, 1999(1999-02-24) (aged 62) Haverhill, Massachusetts, United States |
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| Period | 1967–1998 |
| Genre | Literary fiction |
Andre Jules Dubus II (August 11, 1936 – February 24, 1999) was an American writer ofshort stories,novels, andessays.[1]
Andre Jules Dubus II was born inLake Charles, Louisiana, the youngest child of Katherine (Burke) and André Jules Dubus, a Cajun-Irish Catholic family. His two elder siblings are Kathryn and Beth.James Lee Burke is his first cousin.[2] His surname is pronounced "Duh-BYOOSE", with the accent falling on the second syllable, as in "profuse". Dubus grew up in the Bayou country inLafayette, Louisiana, and was educated by theChristian Brothers, aCatholic religious order that emphasizedliterature and writing. Dubus graduated from nearbyMcNeese State College in 1958 as ajournalism and English major. Dubus then spent six years in theMarine Corps, eventually rising to the rank ofcaptain. At this time he married his first wife and started a family. After leaving the Marine Corps, Dubus moved with his wife and four children toIowa City, where he later graduated from theUniversity of Iowa'sIowa Writers' Workshop with anMFA increative writing, studying underRichard Yates. The family then moved toHaverhill, Massachusetts, where Dubus would spend the bulk of his academic career teaching literature and creative writing atBradford College.[3] He admiredErnest Hemingway,Anton Chekhov, andJohn Cheever.[4]
Dubus's life was marked by several tragedies. His daughter was raped as a young woman, causing Dubus many years of paranoia over his loved ones' safety.[5] Dubus carried personal firearms to protect himself and those around him, until the night in the late 1980s, when he almost shot a man who was in a drunken argument with his son, Andre, outside a bar in Haverhill, Massachusetts.[6]
Dubus was seriously injured in a car accident on the night of July 23, 1986. He was driving fromBoston to his home inHaverhill, Massachusetts, and he stopped to assist two disabled motorists—brother and sister Luis and Luz Santiago. As Dubus assisted the injured Luz to the side of the highway, an oncoming car swerved and hit them. Luis was killed instantly; Luz survived because Dubus had pushed her out of the way. Dubus was critically injured and both his legs were crushed. After a series of unsuccessful operations, his right leg was amputated above the knee, and he eventually lost the use of his left leg. Dubus spent three years undergoing a series of painful operations and extensivephysical therapy.
To help Dubus with mounting medical bills, his friends and fellow writersAnn Beattie,E.L. Doctorow,John Irving,Gail Godwin,Stephen King,John Updike,Kurt Vonnegut, andRichard Yates held a special literary benefit in Boston and raised $86,000.
Despite his efforts to walk with aprosthesis, chronic infections led to him using awheelchair for the remainder of his life, and he battledclinical depression as a result of his condition. Over the course of these struggles Dubus's third wife left him, taking with her their two young daughters.
Dubus eventually continued to write after his accident and produced two books of essays—includingBroken Vessels, which became a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize—and a collection of short stories. Dubus also conducted a weekly writers' workshop in his home.
Dubus spent his later years in Haverhill, until his death from a heart attack in 1999, age 62. He is buried in Greenwood Cemetery, near his home in Haverhill, Massachusetts.[citation needed]
Andre Dubus was married three times and fathered six children. His sonAndre Dubus III is also an author; his most noted book is the novelHouse of Sand and Fog (1999), which was both a finalist for theNational Book Award and the basis for anAcademy Award-nominated film of thesame title. In 2011, Andre Dubus III published a memoir of his life,Townie, which tells of growing up in Haverhill and deals extensively with his relationship with his father and the impoverished conditions faced by his mother and siblings after Dubus left the family for a student.
Dubus was the subject of an essay by Kacey Kowars entitled "A Celebration of Words," and was also paid tribute to inAndre Dubus: Memoirs, a book edited by Kowars and featuring authors such as James Lee Burke, Andre Dubus II, and Andre Dubus III.
Xavier Review Press has published several scholarly titles on Dubus, including a special issue ofXavier Review on both Dubus and his son. In 2001, the press releasedAndre Dubus: Tributes edited by Donald Anderson, and in 2003Leap of the Heart: Andre Dubus Talking edited by Ross Gresham.
Professor Olivia Carr Edenfield editedConversations with Andre Dubus (University Press of Mississippi, 2013) and is the author of the critical monographUnderstanding Andre Dubus (University of South Carolina Press, 2017).
Although he did write one novel,The Lieutenant (1967), Dubus considered himself primarily a writer of short stories and novellas. Throughout his career, he published most of his work in small, distinguished literary journals such asPloughshares[7] andSewanee Review, though he also placed stories in magazines such asThe New Yorker andPlayboy. Dubus remained loyal to a small publishing firm run byDavid R. Godine that published his first works. When larger book publishers approached him with more lucrative deals, Dubus stayed with Godine, switching only toAlfred A. Knopf towards the end of his career to assist with medical bills.
Dubus's collections and novellas include:Separate Flights (1975),Adultery and Other Choices (1977),Finding a Girl in America (1980),The Times Are Never So Bad (1983),Voices from the Moon (1984),The Last Worthless Evening (1986),Selected Stories (1988),Broken Vessels (1991),Dancing After Hours (1996), andMeditations from a Movable Chair (1998). Several writing awards are named after Dubus. His papers are archived atMcNeese State University andXavier University inLouisiana and at the Harry Ransom Humanities Research Center at the University of Texas in Austin.
Italian writer and editor Nicola Manuppelli has translated six collections of short stories and novellas by Dubus for Italian publisherMattioli 1885: "Separate Flights" ("Voli separati"), "The Times Are Never So Bad" ("I tempi non sono mai così cattivi"), "Voices From The Moon" ("Voci dalla luna"), "We Don't Live Here Anymore" ("Non abitiamo più qui"), "Finding a girl in America" ("Il padre d'inverno") "Dancing After Hours" ("Ballando a notte fonda"). For the publication of these works, Manuppelli has included introductions or afterwords by several American authors, including Dennis Lehane, Peter Orner, and Tobias Wolff, among others.
In 2017, work began atDavid R. Godine, Publishers to gather together all of the fiction Dubus released with his longtime and loyal publisher between the mid-1970s and late 1980s. The three-volume collected short stories and novellas was conceived of by series editor Joshua Bodwell and is made up of six of Dubus's previous books, two books per volume, plus previously uncollected stories in volume three. The project was a thorough re-launch of the master's work: for the first time since Dubus's stories were originally published by Godine, all of the interior pages were re-set and re-designed; all new cover photographs were commissioned fromGreta Rybus; the paperback originals were given handsome French flaps; and new, original introductions by Ann Beattie, Richard Russo, and Tobias Wolff were commissioned. All three volumes were published in 2018.
After Dubus's death, his story "Killings" was adapted intoTodd Field'sIn the Bedroom (2001) starringSissy Spacek,Tom Wilkinson, andMarisa Tomei. The film was nominated for fiveAcademy Awards –Best Picture,Actor in a Leading Role (Wilkinson),Actress in a Leading Role (Spacek),Actress in a Supporting Role (Tomei), andBest Writing, Screenplay Based on Material Previously Published (Robert Festinger & Field).
The 2004 movieWe Don't Live Here Anymore is based upon two of Dubus's novellas, "We Don't Live Here Anymore" and "Adultery".[8]
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