Literature: Related Content
Effy Redman '04 recently published a piece in The New York Times about growing up with Moebius Syndrome, a condition that renders her unable to smile or make most other facial expressions. In the article, Redman meditates on the difficulties she deals with as a person unable to participate in the many-layered and surprisingly vital social mechanism that is a simple smile.
The Lost Girls, the debut novel of Heather Young MFAW '11, was published this summer by William Morrow. The Lost Girls, while not her first published work, is her first work of fiction.
Lee Clay Johnson '07 is the author of Nitro Mountain, which was published this spring by Knopf. It has been favorably reviewed by several literary journals including Kirkus and Electric Literature and most recently, by the New York Times.
The Imperial Wife, by Irina Reyn MFAW '06, has received widespread critical attention and praise, including an article and interview with NPR, and a review in the Washington Post.
Alice Mattison, award-winning author and core faculty of the MFA Program, was interviewed by Sarai Walker MFA '03 in The Center for Fiction on "looking like a writer," and her new non-fiction guide for authors, The Kite and the String.
Marguerite Feitlowitz, faculty member in literature, was interviewed about her book, A Lexicon of Terror: Argentina and the Legacies of Torture, which explores the verbal atrocities of the 1976-1983 military dictatorship, in in the Buenos Aires Herald.
Anaïs Duplan '14, who attended the MFA program at Iowa Writer’s Workshop after graduating from Bennington, published his first book of poetry with Brooklyn Arts Press. A number of the poems in the collection, titled Take This Stallion, were first written and published when Duplan was a student at Bennington.
Faculty member in literature Benjamin Anastas reviews Elisha Cooper's memoir Falling: A Daughter, a Father, and a Journey Back, an account of the author's daughter's struggle with cancer, for The New York Times.
The class is called Literary Bennington and so is the blog. Both take the canon of Bennington writers—from recent Pulitzer Prize winner Donna Tartt ’86 to Mann Booker Prize winner Kiran Desai ’93 to MacArthur “Genius” Jonathan Lethem ’86 and best-selling author Bret Easton Ellis ’86, as well as the scores of faculty members who laid the literary ground for those who came after: Bernard Malamud, Kenneth Burke, Stanley Edgar Hyman (and his wife, novelist Shirley Jackson), Edward Hoagland, and Lucy Grealy among others—as their subject. The blog, of course, draws more than just the Bennington crowd. Led by faculty member Benjamin Anastas, students publish in-depth interviews with Bennington authors and journalists, and share archival reviews of visiting poets from the school’s student paper and recaps of current literary Bennington controversies among other pieces. It is, at once, a look back and forward and literarybennington.tumblr.com is inviting to the unfolding investigation all of what makes a Bennington writer, and what makes Bennington such a hotbed for writing talent. Below is just one of the many interviews students have conducted, this one with author and journalist Summer Brennan ’01 whose recently released book is featured on page 8, and who was interviewed by An Nguyen ’18.
Rosie Schaap ’94 writes inThe New York Times Magazine about taking part in a photo shoot with Muhammad Ali as a child, and the profound memory of her father connected to that photograph.
Marguerite Feitlowitz pens an essay in Words Without Borders about teaching in translation.
The Governor’s Institutes of Vermont has selected Bennington as home to its newest Institute. The Young Writers Institute at Bennington College, to be held June 19-25 in conjunction with the Bennington Masters of Fine Art in writing, will host 20-25 writers of high school age who will hone their craft, develop critical and collaborative skills, and be inspired by writers teaching at one of the country’s most prestigious low-residency MFA programs.
Bennington Review, a national biannual print journal housed at Bennington College, recently relaunched thirty years after its last publication. The inaugural issue features work by award-winning writers, including recipients of the Pulitzer Prize and the Whiting Writers’ Award, as well as National Endowment for the Arts and Guggenheim fellows.
Summer Brennan '01 won NYU's second annual Matthew Power Literary Reporting Award. Brennan's first book was The Oyster War: The True Story of a Small Farm, Big Politics, and the Future of Wilderness in America. She has written for New York Magazine, Scientific American, Pacific Standard, McSweeneys, The Millions, The Rumpus, and others.
Arlene Heyman '63 spoke with Fresh Air with Terry Gross about her recent collection of short stories,"Scary Old Sex."
Bret Easton Ellis '86 recently saw the Broadway musical adaptation of his novel “American Psycho."
Poet Anaïs Duplan '14 spoke with PBS NewsHour about about his work delving into the history of Mary Bowser, a Civil War spy.
Brooke Allen published a review of Jane Mendelsohn’s Burning Down the House in the New York Times.
A new book of short stories by Arlene Heyman ’63, Scary Old Sex, has received warm praise since its publication early in 2016.
Summer Brennan '01 published an article, "The Invisible Black Man on a Prospect Park Statue" in New York Magazine.
Alexander Chee's latest novel, The Queen of the Night, is being greeted with enthusiastic praise on the heels of its February 2 release. Chee is a faculty member in the MFA in Writing program at Bennington College.
The Wall Street Journal profiles Ann Goldstein '71, who translated works by Elena Ferrante, Jhumpa Lahiri and Primo Levi, and has become a rare celebrity among translators.
Faculty member Brooke Allen's biography of Benazir Bhutto, Favored Daughter, is hailed by Kirkus as "a compelling look at Bhutto’s tumultuous life and Pakistan’s roiling history," while the New York Times describes her contributions to Yours in Haste and Adoration: Selected Letters of Terry Southern, as "excellent and often droll."
The Times Higher Education supplement reviewed Judith Butler's Notes Towards a Performative Theory of Assembly on December 10. According to the review, Butler's mediations on recent mass protests around the world make her work "Everything a book about our planet in the 21st century should be."
Donna Tartt ’86 and Bret Easton Ellis ’86 were included USA Today's must-read list of 10 novels by college-aged writers.
Bruna Dantas Lobato '15 writes about the Juan Goytisolo's 1970 novel in verse, Count Julian, in The Millions, and about a new translation of Ferreira Gullar's Dirty Poem in Asymptote Journal.
Read the poem in the Asymptote Journal.