Charles Portis
Encyclopedia
Charles McColl Portis is an American
author
best known for his novels Norwood
(1966) and the 1968 classic Western
novel True Grit
(1968), both adapted as films. The latter also inspired a film sequel and made-for-TV movie sequel. A new film adaptation of True Grit was released in 2010.
Portis has been described as "one of the most inventively comic writers of western fiction".
.
During the Korean War
, Portis enlisted in the U.S. Marine Corps and reached the rank of sergeant. After receiving his discharge in 1955, he enrolled in the University of Arkansas at Fayetteville. He graduated with a degree in journalism
in 1958.
. One of his tasks was to redact the colorful reporting of "lady stringers" in the Ozarks, a task credited as a source for the vivid voice which he created years later for his character Mattie Ross in True Grit. After Portis graduated, he worked for various newspapers as a reporter, including almost two years at the Arkansas Gazette
, for which he wrote the "Our Town" column.
He moved to New York, where he worked for four years at the New York Herald Tribune
. His work led him to return to the South frequently to cover civil rights–related stories during the early 1960s. After serving as the London
bureau chief of the New York Herald Tribune, he left journalism in 1964.
Portis returned to Arkansas and began writing fiction full-time. In his first novel, Norwood
(1966), he showed his preference for travel narratives with deadpan dialogue, combined with amusing observations on American culture. Based in the mid-1950s, the novel revolves around Norwood Pratt, a young, naïve ex-Marine living in Ralph, Texas. He is persuaded by con-man Grady Fring (the first of several such characters created by Portis) to transport a pair of automobiles to New York City. Norwood encounters a variety of people on the way to New York and back, including ex-circus
midget
Edmund Ratner ("the world’s smallest perfect fat man"), Joann ("the college educated chicken"), and Rita Lee, a girl Norwood woos and wins on the bus ride back to the South. Norwood was adapted as a movie in 1970, starring Glen Campbell
as the title character, with Kim Darby
and the football star Joe Namath
.
Like Norwood, his novel True Grit
(1968) was first serialized in condensed form in the The Saturday Evening Post
. The story is told by Yell County native Mattie Ross who, at the time of the events, is a prim, shrewd, strong-willed, Bible-quoting 14-year-old girl. When her father is murdered in Fort Smith by a hired hand, Tom Chaney, she recruits Deputy Marshal Rooster Cogburn—in whom Mattie sees one possessed of "grit"—to help her hunt down Chaney and his outlaw band to "avenge her father’s blood". Both satirical of Westerns and realistic, the novel succeeded through its taut story line, Mattie’s believable narrative voice, sharp dialogue, and a journalistic attention to details.
Both Norwood and True Grit were adapted as movies starring fellow Arkansan Glen Campbell
, and Kim Darby
, and were commercially successful. John Wayne
won an Academy Award and a Golden Globe for Best Actor for his performance as Rooster Cogburn in True Grit, one of the top box office hits of 1969. True Grit was released on June 11, 1969, earning USD$
14.25 million at the box office. A second film version
, written and directed by Joel and Ethan Coen
, debuted in December 2010.
Portis published several short pieces in The Atlantic Monthly, including the memoir "Combinations of Jacksons" and the story "I Don't Talk Service No More".
Portis currently resides in Little Rock, Arkansas.
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
author
Author
An author is broadly defined as "the person who originates or gives existence to anything" and that authorship determines responsibility for what is created. Narrowly defined, an author is the originator of any written work.-Legal significance:...
best known for his novels Norwood
Norwood (novel)
Norwood is the first novel written by author Charles Portis. Originally published in 1966 by Simon & Schuster, the book follows its namesake protagonist on a misadventurous road trip from his hometown of Ralph, Texas, to New York City and back. During the trip, Norwood is exposed to a comic array...
(1966) and the 1968 classic Western
Western (genre)
The Western is a genre of various visual arts, such as film, television, radio, literature, painting and others. Westerns are devoted to telling stories set primarily in the latter half of the 19th century in the American Old West, hence the name. Some Westerns are set as early as the Battle of...
novel True Grit
True Grit (novel)
True Grit is a 1968 novel by Charles Portis that was first published as a 1968 serial in The Saturday Evening Post. The novel is told from the perspective of a woman named Mattie Ross who recounts the time when she was 14 years old and sought retribution for the murder of her father by a scoundrel...
(1968), both adapted as films. The latter also inspired a film sequel and made-for-TV movie sequel. A new film adaptation of True Grit was released in 2010.
Portis has been described as "one of the most inventively comic writers of western fiction".
Early life
Charles Portis was born in 1933 to Samuel Palmer and Alice Waddell Portis in El Dorado, Arkansas. He was raised and educated in various towns in southern Arkansas, including HamburgHamburg, Arkansas
Hamburg is a city in Ashley County, Arkansas, United States. The population was 3,039 at the 2000 census. The city is the county seat of Ashley County.-Geography:...
.
During the Korean War
Korean War
The Korean War was a conventional war between South Korea, supported by the United Nations, and North Korea, supported by the People's Republic of China , with military material aid from the Soviet Union...
, Portis enlisted in the U.S. Marine Corps and reached the rank of sergeant. After receiving his discharge in 1955, he enrolled in the University of Arkansas at Fayetteville. He graduated with a degree in journalism
Journalism
Journalism is the practice of investigation and reporting of events, issues and trends to a broad audience in a timely fashion. Though there are many variations of journalism, the ideal is to inform the intended audience. Along with covering organizations and institutions such as government and...
in 1958.
Career
Portis began writing in college, for both the University of Arkansas at Fayetteville student newspaper, Arkansas Traveler, and the Northwest Arkansas TimesNorthwest Arkansas Times
The Northwest Arkansas Times is a daily newspaper in Fayetteville, Arkansas and has circulation of 17,807 copies. It is owned by WEHCO Media Inc....
. One of his tasks was to redact the colorful reporting of "lady stringers" in the Ozarks, a task credited as a source for the vivid voice which he created years later for his character Mattie Ross in True Grit. After Portis graduated, he worked for various newspapers as a reporter, including almost two years at the Arkansas Gazette
Arkansas Gazette
The Arkansas Gazette, known as the oldest newspaper west of the Mississippi River, and located from 1908 until its October 18, 1991 closing at the now historic Gazette Building, was for many years the newspaper of record for Little Rock and the State of Arkansas...
, for which he wrote the "Our Town" column.
He moved to New York, where he worked for four years at the New York Herald Tribune
New York Herald Tribune
The New York Herald Tribune was a daily newspaper created in 1924 when the New York Tribune acquired the New York Herald.Other predecessors, which had earlier merged into the New York Tribune, included the original The New Yorker newsweekly , and the Whig Party's Log Cabin.The paper was home to...
. His work led him to return to the South frequently to cover civil rights–related stories during the early 1960s. After serving as the London
London
London is the capital city of :England and the :United Kingdom, the largest metropolitan area in the United Kingdom, and the largest urban zone in the European Union by most measures. Located on the River Thames, London has been a major settlement for two millennia, its history going back to its...
bureau chief of the New York Herald Tribune, he left journalism in 1964.
Portis returned to Arkansas and began writing fiction full-time. In his first novel, Norwood
Norwood (novel)
Norwood is the first novel written by author Charles Portis. Originally published in 1966 by Simon & Schuster, the book follows its namesake protagonist on a misadventurous road trip from his hometown of Ralph, Texas, to New York City and back. During the trip, Norwood is exposed to a comic array...
(1966), he showed his preference for travel narratives with deadpan dialogue, combined with amusing observations on American culture. Based in the mid-1950s, the novel revolves around Norwood Pratt, a young, naïve ex-Marine living in Ralph, Texas. He is persuaded by con-man Grady Fring (the first of several such characters created by Portis) to transport a pair of automobiles to New York City. Norwood encounters a variety of people on the way to New York and back, including ex-circus
Circus
A circus is commonly a travelling company of performers that may include clowns, acrobats, trained animals, trapeze acts, musicians, hoopers, tightrope walkers, jugglers, unicyclists and other stunt-oriented artists...
midget
Midget
A midget is a short person with relatively average bodily proportions in comparison with other human beings. The term is often improperly used to describe a person with the medical condition dwarfism. The two terms are often used synonymously because both terms originate as words defining small...
Edmund Ratner ("the world’s smallest perfect fat man"), Joann ("the college educated chicken"), and Rita Lee, a girl Norwood woos and wins on the bus ride back to the South. Norwood was adapted as a movie in 1970, starring Glen Campbell
Glen Campbell
Glen Travis Campbell is an American country music singer, guitarist, television host and occasional actor. He is best known for a series of hits in the 1960s and 1970s, as well as for hosting a variety show called The Glen Campbell Goodtime Hour on CBS television.During his 50 years in show...
as the title character, with Kim Darby
Kim Darby
Kim Darby is an American actress perhaps best known for co-starring with John Wayne and country singer/actor Glen Campbell in the 1969 western True Grit.-Early life and film career:...
and the football star Joe Namath
Joe Namath
Joseph William "Joe" Namath , nicknamed "Broadway Joe" or "Joe Willie", is a former American football quarterback. He played college football for the University of Alabama under coach Paul "Bear" Bryant and his assistant, Howard Schnellenberger, from 1962–1964, and professional football in the...
.
Like Norwood, his novel True Grit
True Grit (novel)
True Grit is a 1968 novel by Charles Portis that was first published as a 1968 serial in The Saturday Evening Post. The novel is told from the perspective of a woman named Mattie Ross who recounts the time when she was 14 years old and sought retribution for the murder of her father by a scoundrel...
(1968) was first serialized in condensed form in the The Saturday Evening Post
The Saturday Evening Post
The Saturday Evening Post is a bimonthly American magazine. It was published weekly under this title from 1897 until 1969, and quarterly and then bimonthly from 1971.-History:...
. The story is told by Yell County native Mattie Ross who, at the time of the events, is a prim, shrewd, strong-willed, Bible-quoting 14-year-old girl. When her father is murdered in Fort Smith by a hired hand, Tom Chaney, she recruits Deputy Marshal Rooster Cogburn—in whom Mattie sees one possessed of "grit"—to help her hunt down Chaney and his outlaw band to "avenge her father’s blood". Both satirical of Westerns and realistic, the novel succeeded through its taut story line, Mattie’s believable narrative voice, sharp dialogue, and a journalistic attention to details.
Both Norwood and True Grit were adapted as movies starring fellow Arkansan Glen Campbell
Glen Campbell
Glen Travis Campbell is an American country music singer, guitarist, television host and occasional actor. He is best known for a series of hits in the 1960s and 1970s, as well as for hosting a variety show called The Glen Campbell Goodtime Hour on CBS television.During his 50 years in show...
, and Kim Darby
Kim Darby
Kim Darby is an American actress perhaps best known for co-starring with John Wayne and country singer/actor Glen Campbell in the 1969 western True Grit.-Early life and film career:...
, and were commercially successful. John Wayne
John Wayne
Marion Mitchell Morrison , better known by his stage name John Wayne, was an American film actor, director and producer. He epitomized rugged masculinity and became an enduring American icon. He is famous for his distinctive calm voice, walk, and height...
won an Academy Award and a Golden Globe for Best Actor for his performance as Rooster Cogburn in True Grit, one of the top box office hits of 1969. True Grit was released on June 11, 1969, earning USD$
United States dollar
The United States dollar , also referred to as the American dollar, is the official currency of the United States of America. It is divided into 100 smaller units called cents or pennies....
14.25 million at the box office. A second film version
True Grit (2010 film)
True Grit is a 2010 American Western film written and directed by the Coen brothers. It is the second adaptation of Charles Portis' 1968 novel of the same name, which was previously filmed in 1969 starring John Wayne. This version stars Hailee Steinfeld as Mattie Ross and Jeff Bridges as U.S....
, written and directed by Joel and Ethan Coen
Coen Brothers
Joel David Coen and Ethan Jesse Coen known together professionally as the Coen brothers, are American filmmakers...
, debuted in December 2010.
Portis published several short pieces in The Atlantic Monthly, including the memoir "Combinations of Jacksons" and the story "I Don't Talk Service No More".
Portis currently resides in Little Rock, Arkansas.
Novels
Charles Portis has written five novels:- 1966: NorwoodNorwood (novel)Norwood is the first novel written by author Charles Portis. Originally published in 1966 by Simon & Schuster, the book follows its namesake protagonist on a misadventurous road trip from his hometown of Ralph, Texas, to New York City and back. During the trip, Norwood is exposed to a comic array...
- 1968: True GritTrue Grit (novel)True Grit is a 1968 novel by Charles Portis that was first published as a 1968 serial in The Saturday Evening Post. The novel is told from the perspective of a woman named Mattie Ross who recounts the time when she was 14 years old and sought retribution for the murder of her father by a scoundrel...
- 1979: The Dog of the South
- 1985: Masters of Atlantis
- 1991: Gringos
Short fiction and articles
- "The New Sound from Nashville," Saturday Evening Post, 239 (12 February 1966): 30-38.
- "Traveling Light," Saturday Evening Post, 239 (18 June 1966): 54-77 ; 239 (2 July 1966): 48-75. (The revised, serialized version of Norwood).
- "True Grit," Saturday Evening Post, 241 (18 May 1968): 68-85; 241 (1 June 1968): 46-61; 241 (15 June 1968): 44-57. (The condensed, serialized version of True Grit).
- "Your Action Line", The New Yorker Archive, 53 (12 December 1977): 42-43. Faulkner Wells, Dean, ed. The Great American Writers' Cookbook. Oxford: Yoknapatawpha Press (1981).
- "Nights Can Turn Cool in Viborra", The Atlantic Monthly, 270 (Dec. 1992): 101-106.
- "I Don't Talk Service No More." The Atlantic Monthly, May, 1996, Vol. 277, No. 5, pp. 90–92.
- "Combinations of Jacksons." The Atlantic Monthly, May, 1999, Vol. 283, No. 5, pp. 81–92. (A Memoir).