Lawrence Thornton (born 1937) is an American novelist and critic. He lives in Claremont, California. His most well known work is Imagining Argentina, a novel that employes the methods of magic realism to tell a story of the Dirty War (1976-l983). The Argentine Trilogy consists of "Imagining Argentina, "Naming the Spirits and "Tales from the Blue Archives." His work has been published in eighteen languages. In l994 a film was made of Imagining Argentine by Christopher Hampton starring Antonio Banderas, Emma Thompson, Claire Bloom and Michael Wood. In l996, Zorongo Flamenco, A Minneapolis-base flamenco troupe, staged a flamenco version of the novel that featured an international cast of dancers and singers. In addition to writing six novels, he is the author of a non-fiction study of modern fiction, "Unbodied Hope," as well as scholarly articles in PMLA, Comparative Literature, American Literature, Modern Fiction Studies and other learned journals. During the l990s he was a regular reviewer for The New York Times Book Review.
BIOGRAPHY After graduating from high school, Thornton attended the University of California, Santa Barbara, receiving a B.A. (1960), M.A. (l967) and Ph.D. (1973). During graduate school he met Toni Clark. They were married in l969. He taught at Montana State University from l974 to l984 when he left his tenured position for a visiting one at UCLA. After Imagining Argentina was published in l987, he taught creative writing part-time at UC Santa Barbara, UC Irvine, and Pomona College before retiring in 2009.
AWARDS Gold Medal, Commonwealth Club of California l996 California Aerts Council Artists' Fellowship l993 National Endowment for the Arts Fellowship l989 John Simon Guggenheim Fellowshiup l988 PEN/Hemingway Foundation Award l987 Silver Medal, Commonwealth Club of California l987 Finalist, PEN/Faulkner Award l987 PEN Center USA West Award for Best Novel of l987 Shirley Collier Award in Fiction UCLA l987 American Council of Learned Societies Grant l984 National Endowment for the Humanities Fellowship l975,l979, l980
PUBLICATIONS
Sailors on the Inward Sea Free Press, 2004 Tales from the Blue Archives Doubleday l997 Naming the Spirits Doubleday l995 Ghost Woman Ticknor & Fields l992 Under the Gypsy Moon Doubleday l990 Imagining Argentina Doubleday l987 Unbodied Hope: Narcissism and the Modern Novel Bucknell University Press l984