Ennis del Mar and Jack Twist, two ranch hands,come together when they're working as sheepherderand camp tender one summer on a range above thetree line. At first, sharing an isolated tent, the attraction is casual, inevitable, but something deepercatches them that summer.

Both men work hard, marry, and have kids becausethat's what cowboys do.

Annie Proulx has written some of the most originaland brilliant short stories in contemporary literature,and for many readers and reviewers, "BrokebackMountain" is her masterpiece. Ennis del Mar and Jack Twist, two ranch hands,come together when they're working as sheepherderand camp tender one summer on a range above thetree line. At first, sharing an isolated tent, the attraction is casual, inevitable, but something deepercatches them that summer. Both men work hard, marry, and have kids becausethat's what cowboys do. But over the course of manyyears and frequent separations this relationshipbecomes the most important thing in their lives, andthey do anything they can to preserve it.

The Nero Yorker won the National MagazineAward for Fiction for its publication of"BrokebackMountain," and the story was included in Prize Stories1998." The O. Henry Awards. In gorgeous and hauntingprose, Proulx limns the difficult, dangerous affairbetween two cowboys that survives everything butthe world's violent intolerance.