A short life of the author
Richard Price (b. 1949) was born on 12 October 1949 in the Bronx, New York, and raised in the Bronx housing projects. He studied at Cornell University and the Columbia MFA programme, where he studied with E.L. Doctorow. His background — a working-class Jewish kid from the projects who became a literary novelist — gives his fiction its distinctive authority.
Life and Career
The Wanderers (1974) — a novel about Italian-American gang life in the Bronx in the 1960s — was his debut at twenty-four. Bloodbrothers (1976) continued his exploration of Bronx working-class life. Both were adapted as films.
After a period of screenwriting — he wrote The Color of Money (1986) for Scorsese, Sea of Love (1989), and Ransom (1996) — he returned to fiction with his masterwork.
Clockers (1992) — a 600-page novel about Strike, a young crack dealer in a New Jersey housing project, and Rocco Klein, the homicide detective who believes Strike committed a murder — is a landmark in American crime fiction. Price spent years riding along with Jersey City homicide detectives and drug crews, and the novel’s authority — its understanding of both the police world and the drug world, and of the economic and racial structures that produce both — is total. Spike Lee adapted it as a film in 1995.
Freedomland (1998) — about a white woman who claims a Black man carjacked her with her son in the back seat, triggering a racial crisis — was equally ambitious. Samaritan (2003) and Lush Life (2008) — the latter set on the Lower East Side during its gentrification — continued his exploration of New York’s racial and economic fault lines.
Price was a writer on The Wire (2006–2008), contributing scripts that drew on his deep knowledge of urban policing and drug markets.
Major Works and Themes
Price writes about the intersection of poverty, policing, and race in American cities. His dialogue — transcribed from years of fieldwork — is the finest in contemporary American fiction. His novels are built on observation rather than plot.
Key Works
- The Wanderers (1974)
- Clockers (1992)
- Freedomland (1998)
- Lush Life (2008)
Collecting Price
The Wanderers (1974, Houghton Mifflin) — his debut — brings $100–$300.
Clockers (1992, Houghton Mifflin) — the masterwork — brings $50–$150 for fine firsts. Price signs at New York events.