Michael Cunningham

His first novel, Golden States, was published in 1984 to critical praise. Cunningham found himself dissatisfied with its “modest aims,” however, and has persuaded its publisher to let it go out of print. A Home at the End of the World (1990) also won critical acclaim and epitomized the theme of alternative families that developed in the post-AIDS era. One of its stories, “White Angel,” appeared in Best American Short Stories 1989. Flesh and Blood followed in 1995, again well received by readers and critics.

Cunningham’s major work (so far) is The Hours (1998). Returning to his early inspiration, he chronicled a day in the lives of Virginia Woolf and modern characters. The Hours won the Pulitzer Prize, the PEN/Faulkner Award, and the GLBT Book Award. He also wrote the screenplay for the movie, which won numerous BAFTA, Golden Globe, and Academy Award nominations.

“Human happiness is only interesting to me in its ability to survive disaster, so I write about people who are undergoing some kind of terrible change in their outer lives or some kind of inner crisis,” Cunningham mused in a 2005 interview with Dave Weich. He collaborates regularly, contributing forewords and introductions to others’ collections and reading at conferences and classes. His most recent novel, Specimen Days, returns to the themes and techniques of The Hours in that it incorporates characters from different eras, linked by Cunningham’s connection with Whitman. He also wrote a screenplay (Evening)with Susan Minot based on her novel Evening.

Cunningham teaches in the MFA program at Brooklyn College and at the Fine Arts Work Center in Provincetown. He is in a monogamous partnership of many years with psychoanalyst and artist Ken Corbett. In 2002 he published Land’s End: A Walk in Provincetown, a meditation on the people, nature, and spirit of the town he loves.

“The 1999 Pulitzer Prize Winners: Fiction.” The Pulitzer Prizes, http://www.pulitzer.org, 30 October 2009.

“Award for Fiction.” PEN/Faulkner Foundation, http://www.penfaulkner.org, 30 October 2009.

Garnes, David. “Cunningham, Michael (b. 1952).” glbtq: The Encycolpedia of Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual, Transgender, and Queer Culture, 14 October 2007, http://www.glbtq.com, 30 October 2009.

“Michael Cunningham.” Internet Movie Database, http://www.imdb.com, 30 October 2009.

“Michael Cunningham Biography.” Michael Cunningham Writer, 2006, http://www.michaelcunninghamwriter.com, 30 October 2009.

“Meet the Writers: Michael Cunningham.” Barnes and Noble, 2004, http://www.barnesandnoble.com, 30 October 2009.

Shoup, Barbara and Kimberly Campanello. “Interview: Michael Cunningham.” web del sol, http://webdelsol.com, 30 October 2009.

Shulman, Randy. “Home Making: Michael Mayer and Michael Cunningham’s Perfect Partnership Brings ‘A Home at the End of the World’ to the Big Screen.” Metro Weekly: Washington DC’s GLBT Newsmagazine, 2004 August 5, http://www.metroweekly.com, 30 October 2009.

“Stonewall Book Awards.” American Library Association, http://www.ala.org, 30 October 2009.