Captain Fiction
| Gordon Lish | |
|---|---|
| Born | Gordon Lish February 11, 1934 Hewlett, New York, United States |
| Pen name | Captain Fiction |
| Occupation | Short story writer, novelist, essayist, journalist, professor |
| Language | English |
| Nationality | American |
| Alma mater | University of Arizona |
| Genre | Fiction |
Gordon Lish (born February 11, 1934 in Hewlett, New York) is an American writer. As a literary editor, he championed many American authors, particularly Raymond Carver, Barry Hannah, Amy Hempel, Rick Bass, and Richard Ford. He is the father of the novelist Atticus Lish.
Lish was raised in Hewlett, New York on Long Island; his father was a partner in Lish Brothers, a millinery firm. During his formative years, he suffered from extreme psoriasis and was often ostracized by his peers. He attended Phillips Academy but left without graduating following an altercation with an antisemitic classmate in 1952. While briefly institutionalized in Westchester County, New York following an adverse reaction to the hormone ACTH (used in psoriasis treatment), he developed a friendship with noted poet Hayden Carruth. Following his release, he took a job as a radio broadcaster for WEIL in New Haven, Connecticut under the pseudonym of Gordo Lockwood and continued to correspond with Carruth, who introduced Lish to the Partisan Review. In November 1956, Lish married Loretta Frances Fokes; they would go on to have three children. Shortly thereafter, they relocated to Tuscon, Arizona due to the ameilorative effects of the region's climate on Lish's psoriasis.
After Carruth advised him to attend college, Lish matriculated at the nearby University of Arizona. He majored in English and German and clashed with creative writing instructor Edward Loomis, an adherent of the New Criticism who routinely disparaged Lish's more idiosyncratic influences, including Ralph Waldo Emerson, Dylan Thomas and Jack Kerouac. Nevertheless, Lish completed his degree in two years with honors, graduating in 1959.
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