A short life of the author
David James Duncan (b. 1952) was born on 1 January 1952 in Portland, Oregon. He grew up in a Seventh-Day Adventist family. He lives in Montana and western Oregon.
Life and Career
The River Why (1983) — about Gus Orviston, a young fly fisherman obsessed with catching fish, who moves alone to a cabin on a coastal Oregon river and undergoes a spiritual and philosophical awakening — has been in print for over forty years and is one of the most widely read novels in the Pacific Northwest. It is a fishing novel, a coming-of-age novel, and a spiritual novel.
The Brothers K (1992) — a 645-page family epic about the Chance family of Camas, Washington, centred on a father who was a minor league pitcher and his four sons during the Vietnam era — is his most ambitious work. It draws on Dostoevsky (the title references The Brothers Karamazov), baseball, and American religious conflict.
River Teeth (1995) — essays and stories — and My Story as Told by Water (2001) — environmental essays about rivers and fishing — continued his nonfiction work. Sun House (2023) — a long-awaited third novel — was published after a thirty-year gap.
Key Works
- The Brothers K (1992)
- The River Why (1983)
- Sun House (2023)
Collecting Duncan
The River Why (1983, Sierra Club Books) — the original hardcover — brings $50–$150.