David Vann (b. 1966) is an assistant professor of English at University of San Francisco. He teaches creative nonfiction and fiction. He was a Wallace Stegner Fellow and Jones Lecturer at Stanford University and is the author of the memoir A Mile Down: The True Story of a Disastrous Career at Sea. His work has appeared or is forthcoming in The Atlantic Monthly, Esquire, Outside Magazine, Men's Journal, Writer's Digest, and other magazines.[1]
Vann's collection of stories Legend of a Suicide was published in 2008. Vann's own father committed suicide when Vann was 13, an event which the book explores through several fictionalized viewpoints, including the central novella Sukkwan Island. Alexander Linklater of The Observer called it "an extraordinary, ground-breaking piece of fiction.".[2] Published as a novel in French by Gallmeister, Sukkwan Island was well received critically in France, where it won the Prix Médicis étranger in 2010.
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