Charles Baxter

Charles Morley Baxter(born May 13, 1947) is an American novelist, essayist, and poet.

Baxter was born in Minneapolis, Minnesota, to John and Mary Barber (Eaton) Baxter. He graduated from Macalester College in Saint Paul in 1969. In 1974 he received his PhD in English from the University at Buffalo with a thesis on Djuna Barnes, Malcolm Lowry, and Nathanael West.

Baxter taught high school in Pinconning, Michigan for a year before beginning his university teaching career at Wayne State University in Detroit, Michigan. He then moved to the University of Michigan, where for many years he directed the Creative Writing MFA program. He currently teaches at the University of Minnesota and in the Warren Wilson College MFA Program for Writers.

He was awarded a Guggenheim Fellowship in 1985.

He married in 1976 teacher Martha Ann Hauser and has a son, Daniel.

Novels

• First Light (1987). An eminent astrophysicist and her brother, a small-town Buick salesman, discover how they grew so far apart and the bonds of love that still keep them together.
• Shadow Play (1993). As his wife does gymnastics and magic tricks, his crazy mother invents her own vocabulary, and his aunt writes her own version of the Bible, Five Oaks Assistant City Manager Wyatt Palmer tries to live a normal life and nearly succeeds, but...
• The Feast of Love (2000) (Pantheon Books), a reimagined Midsummer Night's Dream, a story told through the eyes of several different people. Nominated for the National Book Award.A film version of the book, starring Morgan Freeman, Fred Ward and Greg Kinnear and directed by Robert Benton, was released in 2007.
• Saul and Patsy (2003). A teacher's marriage and identity are threatened by a dangerously obsessed teenage boy at his school.
• The Soul Thief (2008). A graduate student's complicated relationships lead to a disturbing case of identity theft, which ultimately leads the man to wonder if he really is who he thinks he is.

Short story and essay collections

• Harmony of the World (1984). Winner of the Associated Writing Programs Award.
• Through the Safety Net (1985)
• Gryphon (1985)
• A Relative Stranger (1990)
• Believers (1997)
• Burning Down the House: Essays on Fiction (1997)
• Gryphon: New and Selected Stories (2011)
• There's Something I Want You to Do: Stories (February 2015)

Non-fiction

• The Art of Subtext: Beyond Plot (2007).Winner of the 2008 Minnesota Book Award for General Non-fiction.

Poetry collections

• Imaginary Paintings (1989)
• The South Dakota Guidebook (1974)
• Chameleon (1970)

Edited works

• A William Maxwell Portrait: Memories and Appreciations (2004)
• Bringing the Devil to His Knees: The Craft of Fiction and the Writing Life (2001)
• Best New American Voices 2001 (2001)
• The Business ofMemory (1999)