Steven Pressfield (born September 1, 1943) is an American author of historical fiction, non-fiction, and screenplays, including his 1995 novel The Legend of Bagger Vance and 2002 non-fiction book The War of Art. Early life Pressfield was born in Port of Spain, Trinidad, in 1943, while his father was stationed there, in the U.S. Navy. Education Pressfield graduated from Duke University in 1965. In 1966, he joined the U.S. Marine Corps, serving as an infantryman. Career Pressfield was an advertising copywriter, schoolteacher, tractor-trailer driver, bartender, oilfield roustabout, attendant in a mental hospital, fruit-picker in Washington state, and screenwriter. His struggles to make a living as an author, including the period when he was homeless and living out of the back of his car, are detailed in his 2002 book The War of Art. Pressfield's first book, The Legend of Bagger Vance, which was loosely based on the Bhagavad Gita, was published in 1995, and was made into a 2000 film of the same name directed by Robert Redford and starring Will Smith, Charlize Theron, and Matt Damon. His second novel, Gates of Fire (1998), is about the Spartans and the battle at Thermopylae. It is taught at the U.S. Military Academy, the United States Naval Academy, and the Marine Corps Basic School at Quantico. In 2012, Pressfield launched the publishing house Black Irish Books with his agent Shawn Coyne. Works Fiction The Legend of Bagger Vance, about a young man coming to terms with his spiritual demons through the medium of golf (1995). Adapted into the film The Legend of Bagger Vance (2000). Gates of Fire, about the Battle of Thermopylae (1998), . The novel is studied at the West Point, the USNA and other military institutions, and topped the list of bestsellers in Greece. Tides of War, a novel of Alcibiades and the Peloponnesian War (2000), Last of the Amazons, in which Theseus, the legendary King of Athens, sets sail to the north coast of the Black Sea inhabited by a race of female warriors (2002), The Virtues of War, about Alexander the Great (2004), The Afghan Campaign, about Alexander the Great's conquests in Afghanistan (2006), Killing Rommel (2008), a fictionalized account of a patrol of the British Long Range Desert Group during the North African Campaign of World War II, The Profession (2011), . Pressfield's first book set in the future, where military force is for hire everywhere.