Irving, John [Winslow]
Irving, John [Winslow]( 1942–),New Hampshire-born author, whose first serio-comic novels, Setting Free the Bears (1968), a tale of two young men's adventures motorcycling through Austria; The Water-Method Man (1972), about an Iowa graduate student's fantastic misadventures; and The 158-Pound Marriage (1974), presenting two couples who engage in mate-swapping, were followed by the enormously popular The World According to Garp (1978), a fanciful story of a wonderfully talented novelist whose life and works are rich and various, but who is murdered at 33 by a disgruntled reader; The Hotel New Hampshire (1981), portraying an exotic family; The Cider House Rules (1985), about the attitudes and perils attending the question of abortion; and A Prayer for Owen Meaney (1989), about a gnomelike figure, Meaney, who has the gift of prophecy and a deep belief that he is God's instrument. Almost totally obsessed...
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