(born 1942) Autobiographical novelist, whose first works, Setting Free the Bears (1968), The Water Method Man (1972) and The 158-Pound Marriage (1974), developed themes that reached fruition in The World According to Garp (1978) and Hotel New Hampshire (1981). Garp, in particular, brought Irving considerable public attention, with its irreverence, its blending of absurdity and realism and its engagement with issues of sex and violence, which the author suggested were the embodiment of American culture.

More recent works include A Prayer for Owen Meany (1989) and The Son of the Circus (1994), in which an aging, Indian-born Garp works among film stars, dwarfs and a murderer in Bombay.