Russo collects Pulitzer in NYC Camden novelist claims fiction prize

NEW YORK – Richard Russo collected his Pulitzer Prize in fiction Thursday at a formal ceremony at Columbia University in New York City. The prize, announced in April and awarded for his latest novel, “Empire Falls,” is worth $7,500.

Sitting between his wife, Barbara, and Pulitzer Prize director Seymour Topping, the Camden novelist rose from his chair to accept the most distinguished American award in journalism and literature.

Among the 21 categories of Pulitzer Prize awards, which range from investigative reporting, editorial and feature writing, to history, biography and poetry, there is a but a single prize for fiction. The award was endowed by the legendary newspaper publisher Joseph Pulitzer and was first given in 1917.

Russo, as pragmatic as many of his book’s central characters are, said he had felt his chance of receiving a Pulitzer was “a long shot,” despite what he acknowledged were “very good reviews” for “Empire Falls.” The book also was Time magazine’s book of the year.

Nonetheless, Russo knows that “Empire Falls” is larger in scope than his previous novels, “Straight Man” and “Nobody’s Fool.” “It’s more full-blown,” he says. An exceptional number of characters come into and out of the story like cards in a three-card monte game. “It transcends time with characters that are dead at the beginning of the novel, and it includes a history of the land.”

“It’s grand company,” said Russo, looking very much at ease at a preceremony reception that included some of the most famous names in American journalism. His affinity for the large number of journalism awardees stems from the fact that “this is an American award – this is just for American writers.” “Empire Falls” is very much about America, as were Philip Roth’s “American Pastoral,” and Larry McCmurtry’s “Lonesome Dove.” Roth won in 1998, and McMurtry in 1986.

Russo said he was pleased that a comic novel had reached the highest level of acclaim. “This was good news for lots of comic novelists; they are not among prize winners, not since ‘Lonesome Dove.'”

There was irony for a man who writes about ordinary lives, without spin or scandal, receiving an award largely bestowed upon writers of the year’s best journalism stories. Plainly told but intricately woven, “Empire Falls” is as descriptive a record of human interaction as a dramatic piece of long form journalism. Yet nothing happens through most of the novel that would prompt a reporter to open his notebook. The characters in the economically depressed mill town of Empire Falls, Me, are ones who circle around and around central themes in their lives until at last the vast amounts of everyday revelations result in small bits of transcendence.

“What these awards share is a moral vision of what is right in this world and what is wrong,” said John Carroll, Pulitzer Board chair and Editor and Executive Vice President of the Los Angeles Times. And it is this that not only underlines the thinking of Miles Roby, the central and moral figure of “Empire Falls,” but the author as well.

Russo has long shown his affinity for the working class. During a period he spent teaching at Colby College, his sympathies deepened for the hardships and of factory workers in mill towns like Waterville and Skowhegan – the template for “Empire Falls.” He grew up in Glovesville, N.Y., another faded mill town.

“I’ve always been interested in ordinary people swept up in economic forces,” he says. “No matter where my novels are set, they’re all about lower middle class life -that’s what I know best. People who don’t often have a lot of voice.”

They can come from any part of New England, he concedes. “These are people asked to make adjustments. They live in an unforgiving climate; they want to keep doing their jobs, which are demanding and they love them and want to continue.”

Russo talked about his enchantment for Maine. “I love Maine. It’s kind of outside the culture in a strange way. A lot of the worst ills that are endemic in America are there. I live life more slowly, you know your neighbors, the pace of life is more conducive to someone like me. I’m a walker. I like to amble my way along. I love living where I live and then escaping from time to time. It feels wonderful to come back,” he says in anticipation of his return.