Russell Banks

Russell Banks (1940-2023) was an American writer of fiction, nonfiction, and poetry. He was the author of 14 novels including Continental Drift, Affliction, The Sweet Hereafter, Cloudsplitter, and The Rule of the Bone, as well as six story collections including The Angel on the Roof. His The Sweet Hereafter and Affliction were adapted into celebrated feature films. Banks lived for a time in Jamaica and in 1980 wrote the novel The Book of Jamaica. He was also the author of Dreaming Up America, a collection of essays questioning American origins, values, heroes, conflicts, and contradictions. Banks made a life’s work of charting the causes and effects of the terrible things “normal” men can and will do. Michael Ondaatje called Banks “the uncompromising moral voice of our time.”