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Literary Real Estate

Annie Proulx’s Wyoming House Can be Yours for $700,000

By Jenny Shank, 9-04-06

Photo courtesy of Ranchbrokers.com.

The AP reported last week that Pulitzer Prize winner Annie Proulx has put her Centennial, Wyoming house on the market. The listing for the property on the website of Western United Realty LLC describes its charms:

"30 minutes from Laramie, WY in the quaint mountain town of Centennial, WY. This wonderful Wyoming home and acreage is sited in Aspen Country with a great common area that includes fishing ponds, trees, outstanding views of mountain peaks and direct access to the national forest. With 3,500 sq. ft., three bedrooms, three baths, this wonderful mountain home is the perfect year around home or weekender."

I found this story interesting for several reasons: Dozens of newspapers across the country ran the AP article, which would indicate that lots of people are interested in where Ms. Proulx lives. I can't recall ever before reading a wire story about a writer selling her house, which suggests that Proulx has achieved a national stature and recognition that extends beyond the usual audience for literary fiction. It also suggests that Proulx is so closely tied to the state of Wyoming in the minds of her fans that her pending move might be an alarming and therefore newsworthy development; the AP article offers the reassurance, however, that Proulx has bought a new ranch "elsewhere in the Cowboy State." (And as an aside, $700,000 for such a lovely home sounds pretty damn reasonable compared to the prices in the Boulder market.)

I also found this story interesting because this sort of hubbub is probably precisely what Proulx moved to Wyoming to avoid. When I saw her speak on a panel about "Brokeback Mountain" at the most recent Denver International Film Festival, she struck me as a private, down-to-earth person who was definitely in possession of that "shock-proof shit detector" that Hemingway advised all writers to develop. Moreover, when Proulx described the seed for the story of "Brokeback Mountain" (based on an observation she made at a bar), it was clear that going around incognito and observing locals are key methods that she uses in the creation of her stories. So now, after the success of "Brokeback Mountain," she might be too famous to be able to eavesdrop in her old stomping grounds. All of which I imagine she finds horrifying, as she probably would the fact that a complete stranger such as myself is musing about her private business affairs.

For the sake of the reading public, let's hope Proulx is able to sell her ranch and relocate to a place where she can be inspired to write more great books as soon as possible.

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