Anne also had the opportunity to work alongside future greats like Fred Chappell. However, her parents urged her to take advantage of an AB Duke full scholarship to Duke University, because they also needed to fund the education of her three younger siblings.Īt Duke, Anne Tyler met, studied under, and charmed Reynolds Price, who was particularly impressed by the young girl’s maturity. Access to libraries allowed her to explore new worlds, where she would discover esteemed writers like Eudora Welty and Gabriel Garcia Marquez.įollowing her graduation from high school at the age of 16 (a feat that she credits to teachers like Phyllis Peacock who pushed her to succeed), it was Anne’s wish to attend Swarthmore College (founded by the Hicksite Branch of the Society of Friends in 1860). Even with her lack of formal education, Anne excelled among her classmates.

Settling down in Raleigh, North Carolina, provided Anne her first taste of the world outside the commune, allowing her the opportunity to finally attend public school.

She has also spoken of being profoundly influenced by The Little House, a novel by Virginia Lee Burton that she read on numerous occasions due to her limited access to books, and whose contents shaped her understanding of people and life in general.īy the time Anne left Celo at the age of 11 along with her family, she found the world to be a very different and surprising place, this stemming from the fact that she had yet to attend public school and had never used a telephone in her life. In her new home, Anne would spend several years of her young life caring for livestock participating in organic farming and partaking in educational activities such as carpentry, art, and cooking, among other subjects taught in a little schoolhouse, although it was not a part of the public school system.Īnne Tyler has often spoken of the first time she experienced the spark of storytelling, and the many hours she would spend under her bedcovers at the age of three, creating stories in her attempt to fall asleep. The Tyler family lived in various Quaker communities before finally settling down in a commune in Celo, North Carolina. With several dozen novels to her name, she has won numerous awards during her writing career, including the Sunday Times Award and the Ambassador Book Award in addition to the Pulitzer, which she won in 1989 for “Breathing Lessons.” Her works place special emphasis on family and marriage in America, and the various conflicts that surround these relationships.Īnne Tyler was born to Lloyd Parry Tyler (industrial chemist) and Phyllis Mahon Tyler (social worker) in Minneapolis, Minnesota. The Best Short Stories of 1921, and the Yearbook of the American Short StoryĪnne Tyler is a Pulitzer Prize-winning novelist born in October 1941. The Best American Short Stories of the Eighties The Best of Best American Short Stories 1915-1950 50 Best American Short Stories, 1915-1939

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