In 2012, the New York State Writers Institute and Fence magazine presented a staged reading of Denis Johnson’s new play-in-progress “Des Moines,” followed by commentary and Q&A with the playwright.
Johnson was the author of poetry, plays and nonfiction. His plays, including Shoppers Carried by Escalators into the Flames, Soul of a Whore, and Purvis have been produced in San Francisco, Chicago, New York, and Seattle.
Johnson’s 2011 novella, Train Dreams, the tale of a day laborer struggling to eke out a living in the 20th century American West, was a finalist for the 2012 Pulitzer Prize. Johnson received the National Book Award for his 2007 novel, Tree of Smoke, about the experiences of a CIA agent based in Vietnam.
Johnson’s 1992 collection of interconnected short stories, Jesus’ Son, about a young man addicted to heroin, was adapted as a same-titled movie which was named a “Top Ten” film of 1999 by the New York Times, Los Angeles Times, and Roger Ebert in the Chicago Sun-Times. The New York Times reviewer said of the book, “No American novelist since William Burroughs has so flagrantly risked ‘insensitivity’ in an effort to depict the pathology of addiction.”