Background Information Introduction of the author Tobias Wolff was born in Alabama in 1945. His parents divorced when he was a boy Wolff s mother retained custody of him, while his brother Geoffrey who also became a writer lived with their father as a child wolff traveled with his mother, Rosemary, to the Pacific Northwest, where she remarried. Growing up in the Pacific Northwest, young Tobias soon was forced to endure life under his strict and cruel stepfather. During the time, his efforts to get away from his in This Boy's Life: A Memoir. Tobias Wolff is perhaps best known by the ted stepfather led to his self-transformation. That period of Wolff s life is recounted American reading public for his memoir This Boy's Life, which was later mad into an acclaimed movie. from 1964 through 1968. Wolff served as a lieutenant with the U.S. Army Special Forces( Green Berets)in Vietnam. He later recounted his wartime experiences in the memoir in the pharaoh s Army: Memoirs of the Lost War. In 1972 Wolff earned his B.A. and then his M.A. from Oxford University with First Class Honors in English three years later. That year, his first book, Ugly Rumours, was published in London. Also that year, he won a prestigious Stegner Fellowship from Stanford University. He lives with his family nes writing at Syracuse University. His lite reputation was first established on the merit of his short stories. He is still primarily known for these short stories, in which he depicts many characters voices and a wide range of emotions. Since the early 1980s, Wolff has produced several collections of short stories. These fictions focus on the important relationships and the moral choices in everyday people's lives: men and women, husbands and wives, parents and children. As scholar Marilyn C. Wesley writes in the Dictionary of literary biography, Wolff writes about the basic needs of Everyman, written with a respect that Everyman deserve Works of the author 1)He is the author of the short novel The barracks Thief, which won the 1985 PEN/Faulkner award 2)two collections of short stories, Back in the World(collecting"Say Yes)and In the Garden of the North American Martyrs, which received the Saint Lawrence Award for fiction in 1982, Mr. Wolffs work appears frequently in Esquire, Vanity Fair, The Atlantic, and other magazines and reviews Historical Context: The passage is written during the republican years The 1980s was a decade led by Republican policy. Ronald Reagan took office as president of the United States in 1980, and served two terms, after which his vice 22 Background Information Introduction of the author Tobias Wolff was born in Alabama in 1945. His parents divorced when he was a boy. Wolff’s mother retained custody of him, while his brother Geoffrey who also became a writer lived with their father. As a child, Wolff traveled with his mother, Rosemary, to the Pacific Northwest, where she remarried. Growing up in the Pacific Northwest, young Tobias soon was forced to endure life under his strict and cruel stepfather. During the time, his efforts to get away from his stepfather led to his self-transformation. That period of Wolff’s life is recounted in This Boy’s Life: A Memoir. Tobias Wolff is perhaps best known by the American reading public for his memoir This Boy’s Life, which was later made into an acclaimed movie, from 1964 through 1968, Wolff served as a lieutenant with the U.S. Army Special Forces (Green Berets) in Vietnam. He later recounted his wartime experiences in the memoir In the Pharaoh’s Army: Memoirs of the Lost War. In 1972 Wolff earned his B.A. and then his M.A. from Oxford University with First Class Honors in English three years later. That year, his first book, Ugly Rumours, was published in London. Also that year, he won a prestigious Stegner Fellowship from Stanford University. He lives with his family in upstate New York and teaches writing at Syracuse University. His literary reputation was first established on the merit of his short stories. He is still primarily known for these short stories, in which he depicts many characters’ voices and a wide range of emotions. Since the early 1980s, Wolff has produced several collections of short stories. These fictions focus on the important relationships and the moral choices in everyday people’s lives: men and women, husbands and wives, parents and children. As scholar Marilyn C. Wesley writes in the Dictionary of Literary Biography, Wolff writes about the basic needs of Everyman, written with a respect that Everyman deserves. Works of the author 1) He is the author of the short novel The Barracks Thief, which won the 1985 PEN/Faulkner Award; 2) two collections of short stories, Back in the World (collecting “Say Yes”) and In the Garden of the North American Martyrs, which received the Saint Lawrence Award for fiction in 1982; Mr. Wolff's work appears frequently in Esquire, Vanity Fair, The Atlantic, and other magazines and reviews. Historical Context: The passage is written during the Republican years The 1980s was a decade led by Republican policy. Ronald Reagan took office as president of the United States in 1980, and served two terms, after which his vice