Introduction & Overview of The Half-Skinned Steer by E. Annie Proulx

The Half-Skinned Steer Introduction

E. Annie Proulx's "The Half-Skinned Steer" was first published in the Atlantic Monthly in November 1997. It was originally written at the invitation of the Nature Conservancy, which asked Proulx to visit one of its preserves and then contribute a story, inspired by her visit, to Off the Beaten Path (1998), an anthology of short fiction. This assignment also inspired Proulx to write Close Range: Wyoming Stories (1999), in which the story was included. By the time it was published, Proulx was already famous for another collection of short stories and three novels, including The Shipping News (1993), which won both the Pulitzer Prize and the National Book Award. Like many of Proulx's works, "The Half-Skinned Steer" features gritty realism in a harsh, natural setting.

"The Half-Skinned Steer" concerns Mero, an eighty-three-year-old man who left his family's ranch sixty years earlier and who must face his past when he...
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