Gary Shteyngart
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| Gary Shteyngart | |
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 Gary Shteyngart at the Los Angeles Times Festival of Books |
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| Born | 1972 Leningrad, USSR |
| Occupation | Novelist |
| Nationality | United States |
Gary Shteyngart (born 1972) is an American writer born in Leningrad, USSR (he alternately calls it "St. Leningrad" or "St. Leninsburg"). Much of his work is satirical and relies on the invention of elaborately fictitious yet somehow familiar places and times.
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[edit] Life
Shteyngart spent the first seven years of his childhood living in a square dominated by a huge statue of Vladimir Lenin in what is now St. Petersburg, Russia; the city was then known as Leningrad. He comes from a Jewish family and describes his family as typically Soviet. His father worked as an engineer in a Lomo camera factory; his mother was a pianist. Shteyngart emigrated to the United States in 1979 and was brought up with no television in the apartment in which he lived, and no spoken English. He did not shed his thick Russian accent until the age of 14.[1]
Having been forbidden to return to Russia, Shteyngart took a trip to Prague. This experience helped spawn his first novel, set in the fictitious European city of Prava. He is a graduate of Stuyvesant High School[2] in New York City, Oberlin College in Ohio, where he earned a degree in politics, and Hunter College of the City University of New York, where he earned an MFA in Creative Writing. During the early 90's, he worked for some time at NYANA, a refugee resettlement agency in New York City. His co-workers there included Alexander Gelman, Alex Halberstadt, Todd Solondz, and Roman Turovsky.
Shteyngart now lives in the Lower East Side of Manhattan. He has taught writing at Hunter College, and currently teaches writing at Columbia University[3] and Princeton University.
Gary Shteyngart was a Citigroup Fellow at the American Academy in Berlin, Germany, for Fall 2007.
[edit] Work
Shteyngart's novels include The Russian Debutante's Handbook (2003) and Absurdistan (2006). His other writing has appeared in The New Yorker, Slate, Granta, Travel and Leisure, and The New York Times. Random House will publish his third novel in September 2009.[citation needed] The novel will feature the character of Jerry Shteynfarb, a self parody of Shteyngart himself, who was introduced in Absurdistan. It will be set in 2040, in a futuristic version of Albany, New York.[4]
[edit] Bibliography
- The Russian Debutante's Handbook (2003)
- Absurdistan (2006)
[edit] References
- ^ Ed Pilkington meets Gary Shteyngart, the author of Absurdistan | News | Guardian Unlimited Books
- ^ Young, Liza (May 2006). "The Metamorphosis of a Writer: An Interview with Gary Shteyngart". Education Update. http://www.educationupdate.com/archives/2006/May/html/car-metamorphosis.html. Retrieved on 2007-11-01.
- ^ Hunter News & Events
- ^ Barnes & Noble website
[edit] External links
- Biography at barnesandnoble.com
- Interview: 'On Meat Over Meat: Dinner with Gary Shteyngart', published in Gigantic #1
- Interview in the Forward
- Interview at Web del Sol.
- Interview from Modern Drunkard Magazine titled '10 Drinks with Gary Shteyngart'
- "Absurdistan", by Gary Shteyngart – Russian Unorthodox, review by Walter Kirn, New York Times, April 30, 2006
- With Zadie Smith at McNally Robinson
- Interview with Gary Shteyngart about Absurdistan, English and Italian version. BOOKSWEB TV
- Over There by Gary Shteyngart from Granta 84
- Interview with Gary Shteyngart: On Travel Writing
