Rivka Galchen
| Rivka Galchen | |
|---|---|
| Born | Toronto, Canada |
| Notable award(s) | William J. Saroyan International Prize for Fiction |
| Spouse(s) | Aaron Harnly (m. 2001) |
Rivka Galchen (born April 19, 1976) is a Canadian-American writer. Her first novel, Atmospheric Disturbances, was published in 2008, has been translated into over 20 languages, and was awarded the William J. Saroyan International Prize for Fiction.
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[edit] Biography
Galchen was born in Toronto, Canada. When she was an infant, her parents relocated to the United States, where she has lived ever since.[1] She lived in Norman, Oklahoma from 1982 to 1994, where her father, Tzvi Gal-Chen, was a professor of meteorology at the University of Oklahoma, and her mother was a computer programmer at the National Severe Storms Laboratory.[2][3] Her parents, of Jewish descent, had emigrated from Israel before her birth.
Galchen began attending Princeton University in 1994, where she was an English major, and applied in her sophomore year to an early-admissions program at the Mount Sinai School of Medicine.[2] She received her M.D. from Mount Sinai in 2003, with a focus in psychiatry.[4] After completing medical school, she completed an MFA at Columbia University, where she was a Robert Bingham fellow.[5] She was a 2006 recipient of the Rona Jaffe Foundation Writers' Award for women writers.[4]
In spring 2011, Rivka Galchen is the Mary Ellen von der Heyden Fiction Fellow at the American Academy in Berlin.[6]
[edit] Writing career
Galchen has written for several national magazines such as The New Yorker, Harper's, the New York Times and The Believer.
Galchen's first novel, Atmospheric Disturbances, features a character with her father's name, Tzvi Gal-Chen; the character is a professor of meteorology and a fellow of the (fictional) Royal Academy of Meteorology, a literary move that was described as an "awfully risky" but successful invocation of "triple unreliability" by critic James Wood of The New Yorker.[7]
Atmospheric Disturbances was represented by the William Morris Agency, which reportedly chose it as one of two books to generate "buzz" for at the 2007 London Book Fair.[8] The novel was purchased by Farrar, Straus and Giroux and published in May 2008.[5] The novel received a significant amount of attention for a debut novel, including favorable reviews on the cover of The New York Times Book Review and by critic James Wood of The New Yorker.[7][9] Wood wrote that the novel was best understood as "a contribution to the Hamsun-Bernhard tradition of tragicomic first-person unreliability."[7] The novel was named as a finalist for the Mercantile Library's 2008 John Sargent Sr. First Novel Prize, and for the Canadian Writers' Trust's 2008 Fiction Prize.[10][11] On 20 October 2008, the novel was named as a finalist for the 2008 Governor General's Award, one of Canada's most prestigious literary prizes.[12]
As of 2009, Galchen teaches writing at Columbia University.[13] She is a Contributing Editor at Harper's Magazine.
In 2010 Galchen was chosen by The New Yorker as one of the top 20 American writers under the age of 40.[14] Her short story "The Entire Northern Side Was Covered with Fire" was published in "Summer Fiction" issue of the same magazine (June 14 & 21, 2010).
[edit] Published works
- Atmospheric Disturbances (2008), novel.[15] Published in Germany by Rowohlt, Reinbek; translated by Grete Osterwald 2010 ISBN 978-3-498-02512-0
- "Dream Machine: The mind-expanding world of quantum computing" (2011) essay in The New Yorker.
- The Region of Unlikeness (2008), short story in The New Yorker.
- From the pencil zone: Robert Walser's masterworklets (2010), essay in Harper's Magazine.
- Disaster Aversion: The Quest to Control Hurricanes (2009), essay in Harper's Magazine.
- "[1]" (2010), short story 'Once an Empire' in Harper's Magazine.
- "Borges on Pleasure Island" (2010), essay in The New York Times
- Case Notes of a Medical Student, multi-media piece in Triple Canopy (online magazine)
- Wild Berry Blue (2008), short story in Open City.[16] Republished in The Best American Nonrequired Reading 2009.[17]
- The Future of Paper (2011), essay in This Land.
- My Mother, Myself Essay in the New York Times.
[edit] References
- ^ "Heartbreak and loss lie beneath fantastic tale". The Calgary Herald. http://www.canada.com/calgaryherald/news/booksandthearts/story.html?id=34343ae4-3df7-4c5e-aa03-68ea05259ecf. Retrieved 2008-10-18.
- ^ a b "Rivka Galchen, M.D. from Oklahoma Is the Latest Successor to Pynchon". The New York Observer. http://www.observer.com/2008/rivka-galchen-m-d-oklahoma-latest-successor-pynchon?page=0%2C2. Retrieved 2008-10-19.
- ^ http://www.observer.com/2008/rivka-galchen-m-d-oklahome-latest-successor-pynchon?page=2
- ^ a b "The Rona Jaffe Foundation Writers' Awards 2006". Archived from the original on 2008-06-05. http://web.archive.org/web/20080605130055/http://www.ronajaffefoundation.org/2006_winners.html. Retrieved 2008-10-19.
- ^ a b "Macmillan: Atmospheric Disturbances". MacMillan Publishers. http://us.macmillan.com/atmosphericdisturbances. Retrieved 2008-10-19.
- ^ http://www.americanacademy.de/uploads/media/20100630_PR_Fellows.pdf
- ^ a b c "She's Not Herself: A first novel about marriage and madness.". The New Yorker. http://www.newyorker.com/arts/critics/books/2008/06/23/080623crbo_books_wood?currentPage=all. Retrieved 2008-10-19.
- ^ Riding, Alan (2007-04-18). "Less Reading, More Schmoozing at London Book Fair". The New York Times. http://www.nytimes.com/2007/04/18/books/18fair.html?_r=1&pagewanted=all&oref=slogin. Retrieved 2008-10-19.
- ^ Schillinger, Liesl (2008-07-13). "Who Do You Love?". The New York Times. http://www.nytimes.com/2008/07/13/books/review/Schillinger-t.html?pagewanted=all. Retrieved 2008-10-19.
- ^ "2008 John Sargent, Sr. First Novel Prize Finalists". The Mercantile Library for Fiction. Archived from the original on 2008-05-31. http://web.archive.org/web/20080531043416/http://www.mercantilelibrary.org/awards/sargent.php. Retrieved 2008-10-19.
- ^ "2008 Rogers Writers' Trust Fiction Prize Finalists". The Writers' Trust. http://www.writerstrust.com/programs_apa_rogers_finalists.html. Retrieved 2008-10-19.[dead link]
- ^ "Toronto-born MD makes shortlist for Governor General's award". The National Post. http://www.nationalpost.com/arts/story.html?id=898443. Retrieved 2008-10-22.[dead link]
- ^ "Not Exactly By The Book: rivka galchen reveals her convoluted route to authorship". The Columbia Spectator. http://www.columbiaspectator.com/eye/index.php/site/article/not-exactly-by-the-book/. Retrieved 2008-10-19.[dead link]
- ^ http://www.newyorker.com/fiction/20-under-40/writers-q-and-a
- ^ Rivka Galchen (2008). Atmospheric Disturbances: A Novel. New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux. ISBN 0-374-20011-4.
- ^ "Open City Archive". Open City. http://www.opencity.org/archive.html. Retrieved 2010-05-06.
- ^ Dave Eggers, ed. (2009). The Best American Nonrequired Reading 2009. New York: Mariner. ISBN 0-547-2416-07.
[edit] External links
[edit] Reviews
 |
Wikimedia Commons has media related to: Rivka Galchen |
- New York Times review of Atmospheric Disturbances
- Baby got books review of Atmospheric Disturbances with biographical information and an interview
- Salon review of Atmospheric Disturbances
- The Economist review of Atmospheric Disturbances
- American Academy in Berlin
[edit] Interviews and profiles
- New York Observer profile of Galchen
- The New Yorker online interview of Galchen
- Anthem Magazine interview of Galchen
- Bookslut interview of Galchen
