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Annie Dillard Research Paper

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Hosford 1

Caitlind Hosford
King
English
8 April 2014
From Backyard Painter to World­Famous Writer
Annie Dillard was born on April 30, 1945 as Meta Ann Doak in Pittsburgh,
Pennsylvania. She was pushed by her high school teachers and attended Hollins College in
Roanoke, Virginia. Dillard studied literature and creative writing. Sometime in her first two years at school she met Richard Dillard, who she would be engaged to marry her sophomore year of college. After she graduated, she married and moved in with her husband. She experimented with all types of art including painting, drawing, and writing poems (Biography). In 1974, she published Pilgrim at Tinker Creek. She then became the youngest woman at 28 to win the
Pulitzer …show more content…

. . Graham Greene, [and] George Eliot” (Annie).
After graduating from Hollins College and getting a house with her husband, a creek called
Tinker Creek, the creek became a source of ideas and a book’s title, Pilgrim at Tinker Creek.
Many of Dillard’s essays are focused on life, death and their relationship with nature. It is unclear why she writes so much about death because she had not experienced death close to her when she was writing.
Dillard was born in 1945, a very important year in America. She was born on the exact day Hitler killed himself. Just days after, World War II ended on May 8th. Dillard grew up in a time of economic prosperity. The 50’s were marked by the red scare, Elvis, conservative yet social people, and the Korean War. In the 60’s, when Dillard was 15­24, Dillard saw anti­Cubism, the Civil Rights Movement, the assassinations of President Kennedy and Dr.
Martin Luther King Jr, and the first man on the moon. She grew up in a very diverse time where emotions were high then broken down after the assassinations. It was a time that would have influenced her writing very much, especially because she was young and people tend to be more influenced by things when they are young.
Dillard is a favorite of critics because she is the youngest to woman to the win Pulitzer prize. Her writing has “a deep knowledge of subjects from many categories of scientific and theological scholarship” (McCleary). Dillard’s writing is very appealing to

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