Tobias Wolff in Powder

Author Invades Cool World

Cool World will take a new turn in the September issue with a work by Tobias Wolff, an award-winning short story writer and memoirist who has drawn comparisons to Ernest Hemingway. Wolff's three books-The Barraks Thief, This Boy's Life, and In Pharaoh's Army-and three collections of short stories (In the Garden of the North American Martyrs, Back in the World, and The Night in Question) have earned him the Pen /Faulkner Award, Saint Lawrence Award, O. Henry Award, and the American Academy of Arts and Letters Award in Literature.

Wolff, 57, learned to ski as a thirteen year-old Boy Scout at Mt. Baker, Washington. "It was a complete fiasco-kids striking off in every direction downhill from the lodge until it dawned on us that we had to get back up," he recalls. Wolff's passion for skiing grew as he traveled and skied throughout Europe while attending Oxford University in England. He now cites Alta, Utah as his favorite place to ski, calling it, "The deepest place in my heart."

The short story, Powder, to appear in the September, 2002 issue will be the first of Wolff's works to appear in a ski magazine. It also signifies a new focus on world-class ski literature for the Cool World department. -Brian Mcleod