By Hillel Italie
Associated Press Writer
Wednesday, Oct. 13, 1999; 2:01 p.m. EDT

NEW YORK –– "Dutch" didn't get one. Neither did Frank McCourt. Instead, the National Book Award nominations Wednesday went mostly to lesser-known works such as Ha Jin's "Waiting," a novel by a former member of China's People's Liberation Army.

Both McCourt and "Dutch" author Edmund Morris received wide acclaim for their previous books. But McCourt, who won the Pulitzer Prize for "Angela's Ashes," has gotten much weaker reviews for his current memoir, "'Tis." And Morris, winner of both the Pulitzer and the NBA for his biography of Theodore Roosevelt, has been ridiculed for inserting himself as a fictional character in his biography of former President Reagan.

This year marks the 50th anniversary of the NBAs, and E. Annie Proulx, David McCullough and other past winners will attend the Nov. 17 gathering in New York.

Only one of this year's finalists, biographer Judith Thurman, has ever won an NBA. And only two, Thurman and poet Louise Gluck, have even been nominated.

The biggest name among the class of '99 is Oprah Winfrey, who will receive an honorary prize for her "influential contribution to reading and books." Another celebrity, Steve Martin, will serve as the evening's master of ceremonies.

Ha Jin, a Chinese immigrant who teaches at Emory University, is among the five fiction nominees. Andre Dubus III, son of the late fiction writer and essayist, was cited for his novel "House of Sand and Fog." The other finalists are Kent Haruf, whose novel "Plainsong" is emerging as a major critical and commercial favorite; Patricia Henley for "Hummingbird House"; and Jean Thompson for the story collection "Who Do You Love?"

The nonfiction finalists include Mark Bowden for "Black Hawk Down: A Story of Modern War" and Thurman for "Secrets of the Flesh," a biography of the French author Colette. Also nominated were Natalie Angier for "Woman: An Intimate Geography," John W. Dower for "Embracing Defeat: Japan in the Wake of World War II," and John Phillip Santos for "Places Left Unfinished at the Time of Creation."

Besides Gluck, who was cited for the collection "Vita Nova," the poetry finalists are Ai (real name Florence Anthony) for "Vice: New and Selected Poems," Clarence Major for "Configurations: New & Selected Poems 1958-1998," Sherod Santos for "The Pilot Star Elegies," and C.K. Williams for "Repair."

Louise Erdrich, overlooked for such acclaimed fiction as "Love Medicine" and "Tracks," made it this year in the Young People's Literature category for "The Birchbark House." Her fellow nominees are Laurie Halse Anderson for "Speak," Kimberly Willis Holt for "When Zachary Beaver Came to Town," Polly Horvath for "The Trolls," and Walter Dean Myers for "Monster."

The awards are sponsored by the National Book Foundation, a nonprofit organization.

Each winner receives $10,000.