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Levi Savage Peterson (born 1933) is a Mormon biographer, essayist and fictionist whose best-known works include a seminal biography of Juanita Brooks,[1] his own autobiography, and his novel The Backslider, a "standard for the contemporary Mormon novel."[2] He was born and reared in the Mormon community of Snowflake, Arizona and is an emeritus professor of English at Weber State University in Ogden, Utah.[3] He served a mission for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in French-speaking Switzerland and Belgium from 1954 to 1957. He edited Dialogue: A Journal of Mormon Thought from 2004 to 2008.
 | A major contributor to this article appears to have a close connection with its subject. (March 2024) |
Peterson's work as a writer centers in "the possibility of wrong behavior"; his works "variously examine the tension between Sainthood as fact and Sainthood as aspiration, between belief and doubt, and between expected blessings and the traumas of reality."[4] Similarly, he taught his writing students to "write from the other side of your inhibitions."[5] In an essay entitled "In Defense of a Mormon Erotica," Peterson stated that "prudery reinforces pornography" by hiding sexual feelings.[6]: 124 He encouraged Mormon authors to include sexual content and obscenities (in an appropriate amounts) in their work, writing that "there is a vitality in sexual imagery and obscenities."[6]: 124, 127
Peterson has been the recipient of several AML Awards: Short Fiction (1978) for "The Confessions of Augustine", Short Fiction (1982–1983) for "The Canyons of Grace", Special Award for Short Story Anthology (1982–1983) for Greening Wheat: Fifteen Mormon Short Stories, Novel (1986) for The Backslider, Special Recognition in Biography (1988) for Juanita Brooks: Mormon Woman Historian, Honorary Lifetime Membership (1988), Smith-Pettit Foundation Award for Outstanding Contribution to Mormon Letters (2009), and Short Fiction (2016) for "Kid Kirby". Additionally, his work has been a finalist in the short fiction category twice: 2014 ("Jesus Enough") and 2019 ("Bode and Iris").
- Peterson, Levi S. (1982), The Canyons of Grace, University of Illinois Press (Later republished by Signature Books), ISBN 0-941214-26-5, OCLC 8306271
- Peterson, Levi S., ed. (1983), Greening Wheat: Fifteen Mormon Short Stories, Orion Books/Signature Books, ISBN 0941214125, OCLC 10118168
- —— (1986), The Backslider, Signature Books, ISBN 0941214451, OCLC 14378627
- —— (1988), Juanita Brooks: Mormon Woman Historian, Utah Centennial Series, University of Utah Press, ISBN 978-1-60781-151-0, OCLC 18106573
- —— (1990), Night Soil: New Stories, Signature Books, ISBN 1560850035, OCLC 21873653
- —— (1995), Aspen Marooney, Signature Books, ISBN 1560850787, OCLC 33166649
- —— (2006), A Rascal by Nature, A Christian by Yearning: A Mormon Autobiography, University of Utah Press, ISBN 978-0-87480-851-3, OCLC 62766043
- —— (2021), Losing a Bit of Eden, Signature Books, ISBN 9781560852926
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