Close Range: Wyoming Stories is a 1999 collection of short stories written by E. Annie Proulx. The stories are set in the desolate landscape of rural Wyoming and detail the often grim lives of the protagonists.
The best known story from the collection is Brokeback Mountain, which was previously published as a 64-page novella in 1998. The story was the basis for Ang Lee's 2005 film, Brokeback Mountain, starring Heath Ledger and Jake Gyllenhaal.
The volume includes 11 short stories:
- "The Half-Skinned Steer"
- "The Mud Below"
- "Job History"
- "The Blood Bay"
- "People in Hell Just Want a Drink of Water"
- "The Bunchgrass Edge of the World"
- "Pair a Spurs"
- "A Lonely Coast"
- "The Governors of Wyoming"
- "55 Miles to the Gas Pump"
- "Brokeback Mountain"
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“Long before I wrote stories, I listened for stories. Listening for them is something more acute than listening to them. I suppose it’s an early form of participation in what goes on. Listening children know stories are there. When their elders sit and begin, children are just waiting and hoping for one to come out, like a mouse from its hole.”
—Eudora Welty (b. 1909)