  ernest james gaines (born january 15, 1933) is an african-american author. his works have been taught in college classrooms and translated into many languages, including french, spanish, german, russian and chinese. four of his works have been made into television movies.lockhart, john m. "words & music", the riverside reader, february 4, 2008, p. 1 his 1993 novel, a lesson before dying, won the national book critics circle award for fiction. gaines has been a macarthur foundation fellow, awarded the national humanities medal, and inducted into the french ordre des arts et des lettres (order of arts and letters) as a chevalier. == biography == gaines was among the fifth generation of his sharecropper family to be born on a plantation in pointe coupee parish, louisiana. this became the setting and premise for many of his later works. he was the eldest of 12 children, raised by his aunt, who was crippled and had to crawl to get around the house. although born generations after the end of slavery, gaines grew up impoverished, living in old slave quarters on the plantation. gaines' first years of school took place in the plantation church. when the children were not picking cotton in the fields, a visiting teacher came for five to six months of the year to provide basic education. gaines then spent three years at st. augustine school, a catholic school for african americans in new roads, louisiana. schooling for african-american children did not continue beyond the eighth grade, during this time in point coupee parish. when he was 15 years old, gaines moved to vallejo, california, to join his mother and stepfather, who had left louisiana during world war ii. his first novel was written at age 17, while babysitting his youngest brother, michael. according to one account, he wrapped it in brown paper, tied it with string, and sent it to a new york publisher, who rejected it. gaines burned the manuscript, but later rewrote it to become his first published 
1933_births 20th-century_American_novelists 21st-century_American_novelists African-American_novelists African-American_writers American_male_novelists Chevaliers_of_the_Ordre_des_Arts_et_des_Lettres Guggenheim_Fellows Living_people MacArthur_Fellows Members_of_the_American_Academy_of_Arts_and_Letters National_Humanities_Medal_recipients People_from_Pointe_Coupee_Parish,_Louisiana Postmodern_writers San_Francisco_State_University_alumni Stanford_University_alumni University_of_Louisiana_at_Lafayette_faculty Writers_from_Louisiana