Charles Johnson is the author of four novels---Faith and the Good Thing (1974), Oxherding Tale (1982), Middle Passage, and Dreamer (1998); a collection of short stories The Sorcerer's Apprentice (1986), which was one of five finalists for the 1987 PEN/Faulkner Award; a work of aesthetics Being and Race: Black Writing Since 1970; and numerous other works. As a journalist and political cartoonist in the 1970's, he published over 1000 drawings in national publications. He has written over 20 screenplays, including "Booker" which received the international Prix Jeunesse Award and a 1985 Writers Guild Award. The option for an American film of his novel Dreamer was recently granted to actor Jon Voight. His work has been the subject of special sessions of the Modern Language Association (1991 & 1996), the International Association for Philosophy and Literature (2000 & 2001), the winter 1997 issue of African-American Review, and at least three critical books published or forthcoming. The Academy of Arts and Letters presented him with the 2002 Academy Award for Literature.

Dr. Johnson is a former director of the creative writing program at the University of Washington where he currently holds the S. Wilson and Grace M. Pollock Professorship for Excellence in English. He earned his PhD from SUNY-Stony Brook which presented him with an honorary Doctor of Letters degree in 1999. Southern Illinois University, his undergraduate and masters degree alma mater, administers the "Charles Johnson Award for Fiction and Poetry," a nationwide competition for college students inaugurated in 1994. Middle Passage was previously selected as required reading for all freshmen students at Stanford University, Washington & Lee University, and Wofford College, among others.