ABOUT TIM O'BRIEN

Tim O'Brien is from small

town Minnesota. He was
born in Austin on
October 1, 1946, a birth
date he shares with
several of his characters
(as well as with his
webmaster!), and grew
up in Worthington,
"Turkey Capital of the
World."

He matriculated at
Macalester College.
Graduation in 1968
found him with a BA in
political science and a
draft notice.

O'Brien was against the

war, but reported for service and was sent to Vietnam with what has
been called the "unlucky" American division due to its involvement in the
My Lai massacre in 1968, an event which figures prominently in In the
Lake of the Woods. He was assigned to 3rd Platoon, A Co., 5th Batt. 46th
Inf., as an infantry foot soldier. O'Brien's tour of duty was 1969-70.

After Vietnam he became a graduate student at Harvard. No doubt he

was one of very few Vietnam veterans there at that time, much less
Combat Infantry Badge (CIB) holders. Having the opportunity to do an
internship at the Washington Post, he eventually left Harvard to become
a newspaper reporter. O'Brien's career as a reporter gave way to his
fiction writing after publication of his memoir If I Die in a Combat
Zone, Box Me Up and Send Me Home.

Tim O'Brien is now a visiting professor and endowed chair at Southwest

Texas State University where he teaches in the Creative Writing
Program. He is on the advisory board for The Ridenhour Prizes. O'Brien's
archive is held by the Harry Ransom Center (slideshow) in Austin, Texas.

"A true war story is never moral. It does not instruct, nor
encourage virtue, nor suggest models of proper human behavior,
nor restrain men from doing the things men have always done. If
a story seems moral, do not believe it. If at the end of a war story
you feel uplifted, or if you feel that some small bit of rectitude
has been salvaged from the larger waste, then you have been
made the victim of a very old and terrible lie. There is no
rectitude whatsoever. There is no virtue. As a first rule of thumb,
therefore, you can tell a true war story by its absolute and
uncompromising allegiance to obscenity and evil. "
 BOOK AWARDS
 National Book Award in fiction - Going After Cacciato

 France's Prix du Meilleur Livre Etranger - The Things They

Carried

 Finalist for the Pulitzer Prize - The Things They Carried

 Finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award - The Things
They Carried

 James Fenimore Cooper Prize from the Society of American

Historians - In The Lake of the Woods

 Named best novel of the year by Time magazine - In The Lake

of the Woods

SHORT FICTION HONORS

 National Magazine Award - short story: The Things They Carried

 Included in The Best American Short Stories of the Century edited by John
Updike - short story: The Things They Carried

LITERARY ACHIEVEMENT AWARDS

 American Academy of Arts and Letters

 Guggenheim Foundation

 National Endowment for the Arts.

ELECTED MEMBERSHIPS
 Society of American Historians

 American Academy of Arts and Sciences