La Cañada High School Alums do well!

LCHS Makes it Big Time!

Cunningham takes Pulitzer
By Carol Cormaci

Michael Cunningham, a 1970 graduate of La Cañada High School, learned Monday afternoon he was the winner the coveted Pulitzer Prize in fiction for his third novel, "The Hours."

Cunningham, who now makes his home in New York City, was characterized by his father, La Cañada resident Don Cunningham, as being appropriately emotional about the news.

"Michael has become a New Yorker and is usually cool about everything," the senior Cunningham said Tuesday evening. "But yesterday he was very choked up.

"We're excited and thrilled," said Don Cunningham, speaking for himself and his wife, (Michael's mother), Dorothy. "We knew he was one of three finalists and we had been biting our nails and rationalizing about how nice it is just to be nominated."

It was Cunningham's second win this month - on April 8 he was also named the winner of the 1999 PEN/Faulkner Award for Fiction for "The Hours." A special ceremony in honor of Cunningham and fellow PEN/ Faulkner nominees Russell Banks, Barbara Kingsolver, Brian Morton and Richard Selzer will be held at the Folger Shakespeare Library in Washington, D.C. on May 15.

Nine days later, on May 24, Cunningham and the other Pulitzer winners will receive their prizes during an awards luncheon held at Columbia University in New York.

His parents intend to be on hand for both events.

"We don't want to miss the excitement," said Don.

In "The Hours," Cunningham draws on the life and work of Virginia Woolf, intertwining it into the lives of two contemporary women. The novel was recognized earlier this year as a nominee for the National Book Critics Circle award.

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