Essential Saroyan

Edited by William E. Justice

A selection of William Saroyan's best writings

His name was on the lips of two generations, and countries around the world clamored for his work. An Armenian who grew up in the fields of Fresno, California, he traveled the globe, living in Paris, London, New York, and Los Angeles. He rubbed elbows with Steinbeck, traded insults with Hemingway, encouraged a young Toshio Mori, and stole a girl from Orson Welles. He was the only writer to turn down the Pulitzer Prize. Through his plays, short stories and novels, he exalted the mysteries of youth, pondered the impossibility of love, and spoke to this strange condition of being alive. Above all, he declared that the duty of a writer is to have one hell of a good time.

About the Editor

William Emery Justice, a fourth-generation Kansan, attended the University of Kansas, where he studied Russian literature and language, German literature, and religion. He worked as a farm laborer, a pizza maker, a vacuum salesman (he didn’t sell a single machine), a roofer, a doughnut fryer, a bookbinder, a convenience store clerk (third shift), a copyist, and a video store clerk before joining Heyday Books. He co-edited California Uncovered: Stories for the 21st Century (also published by Heyday Books) and is writing a novel placing Orpheus in a mythical Kansas.