Alice McDermott
Alice McDermott | |
|---|---|
| Born | June 27, 1953 Brooklyn, New York, U.S. |
| Occupation | Novelist, essayist |
| Education | State University of New York, Oswego (BA) University of New Hampshire (MA) |
| Genre | Literary fiction |
| Website | |
| www | |
Alice McDermott (born June 27, 1953) is an American writer and university professor. She is the author of nine novels and a collection of essays. For her 1998 novel Charming Billy she won an American Book Award[1] and the U.S. National Book Award for Fiction[2] and was a finalist for the International Dublin Literary Award and the Orange Prize. That Night, At Weddings and Wakes, and After This were finalists for the Pulitzer Prize. Her most recent novel, Absolution was awarded the Mark Twain American Voice in Literature Award.
From 2002 to 2019, McDermott was the Johns Hopkins University's Richard A. Macksey Professor of the Humanities.
Life
[edit]McDermott was born in Brooklyn, New York. She attended St. Boniface School in Elmont, New York, on Long Island (1967), Sacred Heart Academy in Hempstead (1971), and the State University of New York at Oswego, receiving her BA in 1975, and received her MA from the University of New Hampshire in 1978.
She is the recipient of several honorary degrees including Boston College, Georgetown University School of Continuing Studies, University of New Hampshire, SUNY Oswego, Mount St. Mary's University, La Salle University, Regis College, The College of the Holly Cross.
She has taught at UCSD and American University, has been a writer-in-residence at Lynchburg College and Hollins College in Virginia, and was lecturer in English at the University of New Hampshire. In 2012 she was the D'Angelo Scholar-in-Residence, St. John's University. From 2002 to 2019, McDermott was the Richard A. Macksey Professor of the Humanities at Johns Hopkins University. For two decades McDermott served on the faculty of Sewanee Writers Conference. Her short stories have appeared in Harper's Bazaar, Commonweal, The Sewanee Review, Ms., Redbook, Mademoiselle, The New Yorker, Good Housekeeping, and Seventeen. She has also published articles in The New York Times and The Washington Post.
McDermott lives outside Washington, D.C., with her husband, a neuroscientist, and three grown children. She is Catholic, though she once deemed herself "not a very good Catholic."[3]
Awards and honors
[edit]- A Bigamist's Daughter, (1982) New York Times Notable Book of the Year
- That Night (1987) – Finalist for the National Book Award,[4] the PEN/Faulkner Award for Fiction, the Pulitzer Prize,[5] and Los Angeles Times Book Prize. New York Times Notable Book of the Year. Film Adaptation, Warner Brothers.
- 1987 Whiting Award
- At Weddings and Wakes (1992) – Finalist for the Pulitzer Prize,[5] New York Times Notable Books of the Year.
- Charming Billy (1998) –New York Times Best Seller, winner of an American Book Award (1999)[1] and the National Book Award.[2] Finalist: International Dublin IMPAC Award; The Orange Prize. Best Books of the Year: Time Magazine, The Washington Post, and The San Francisco Chronicle. New York Times Notable Books of the Year. Stage Adaptation, The Round House Theater, Maryland.
- Child of My Heart : A Novel (2002) – Nominated for the International Dublin Literary Award. Book Magazine Best Books of the Year. New York Times Notable Book of the Year.
- 2004 - The Gaudium Prize
- After This (2006) – Finalist for the Pulitzer Prize.[5] Nominee: International Dublin Literary Award. Best Books of the Year: The Atlantic Monthly, The Boston Globe, The Washington Post, The Chicago Tribune, The Christian Science Monitor, NPR. New York Times Notable Books of the Year.
- 2008 - The Corrington Award for Literature.
- In 2010 McDermott received the Fitzgerald Prize for Literary Excellence.
- Someone (2013) – Longlisted for the 2013 National Book Award Fiction. Finalist for the International Dublin Literary Award, the National Book Critics Circle Award, Patterson Fiction Prize, the Dayton Literary Peace Prize. Best Books of the Year: NPR, Barnes and Noble, Kirkus Reviews, Publishers Weekly, Kansas City Star, Washington Post, Chicago Tribune, Tampa Observer, New York Times Notable Books of the Year.
- 2013 – Inducted into the New York Writers Hall of Fame.
- 2015 - The Mary McCarthy Award, Bard College
- 2018 - The Ninth Hour - New York Time Best Seller: Winner of the Prix Femina étranger for La Neuvième Heure, translation of The Ninth Hour. Finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award, Kirkus Prize for Fiction; Semi-Finalist The Carnegie Medal for Fiction. Best Books of the Year: Time Magazine, The Wall Street Journal, The Library Journal, NPR, Kirkus Review, Washington Post, Publishers Weekly, Barnes and Noble, New York Time Notable Book of the Year
- 2019 - The Seamus Heaney Award for Literature, Glucksman Ireland House.
- 2023 Absolution: New York Time Best Seller. Winner Mark Twain American Voice in Literature Award. Short List: Pen Faulkner Award. Barnes and Noble Book of the Month Club Selection. Named a Best Book of the Year by Time, Esquire, Good Housekeeping, Kirkus Reviews, Los Angeles Times, NPR, Oprah Daily, Real Simple and Vogue.
- 2024 - Inducted into the American Academy of Arts and Letters
- 2024 - Recipient of the Eugene O'Neil Lifetime Achievement Award.
Bibliography
[edit]Novels
[edit]- A Bigamist's Daughter. New York: Random House. 1982.
- That Night. Farrar, Straus and Giroux. 1987. ISBN 9781429929745.
- At Weddings and Wakes: A Novel. Farrar, Straus and Giroux. 1992. ISBN 9781429929622.
- Charming Billy. Farrar, Straus and Giroux. 1998. ISBN 9781429929707.
- Child of My Heart. Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2002; 2013, ISBN 9781408806678
- After This. Farrar, Straus and Giroux. 2006. ISBN 9780440337300.
- Someone. Farrar, Straus and Giroux. 10 September 2013. ISBN 9780374281090.
- The Ninth Hour: A Novel. Farrar, Straus and Giroux. 19 September 2017. ISBN 9780374280147.
- Absolution: A Novel. Farrar, Straus and Giroux. 31 October 2023. ISBN 9780374610487.[6]
Essays
[edit]- What About the Baby? Farrar, Straus, and Giroux. 17 August 2021. ISBN 9780374130626.[7][8]
Notes
[edit]- ^ a b American Booksellers Association (2013). "The American Book Awards / Before Columbus Foundation [1980–2012]". BookWeb. Archived from the original on March 13, 2013. Retrieved September 25, 2013.
1999 [...] Charming Billy, Alice McDermott
- ^ a b
"National Book Awards – 1998". National Book Foundation. Retrieved 2012-03-27.
(With essays by Alice Elliott Dark and Katie McDonough from the Awards 60-year anniversary blog.) - ^ Boston College Magazine article by her
- ^ "National Book Awards – 1987". National Book Foundation. Retrieved 2012-03-27.
- ^ a b c "Fiction". Past winners & finalists by category. The Pulitzer Prizes. Retrieved 2012-03-27.
- ^ Patrick, Bethanne (2023-11-07). "'I look for the scary story': How Alice McDermott turned the Vietnam War novel inside out". Los Angeles Times. Retrieved 2024-03-08.
- ^ McDermott, Alice. "Books". Alice McDermott. Archived from the original on 2021-07-09. Retrieved 1 July 2021.
- ^ "What About the Baby?". Macmillan Publishers. Archived from the original on 2021-06-03. Retrieved 1 July 2021.
External links
[edit]- Official website
- Alice McDermott on Facebook
- Alice McDermott on Goodreads
- Biography at BookBrowse.com
- Bibliography at FantasticFiction
- Alice McDermott at Library of Congress Authorities — with 14 catalog records
- Alice McDermott, The Art of Fiction No. 244, Paris Review, Fall 2019
Publisher profiles
[edit]- Profile at Commonweal
- Profile at The Sewanee Review
- Profile at Whiting Foundation
Reviews
[edit]- 1953 births
- Living people
- 20th-century American novelists
- 20th-century American women writers
- 21st-century American novelists
- 21st-century American women writers
- American Book Award winners
- American women novelists
- Catholics from New York (state)
- Johns Hopkins University faculty
- National Book Award winners
- Novelists from Maryland
- PEN/Faulkner Award for Fiction winners
- People from Elmont, New York
- People from Hempstead, New York
- State University of New York at Oswego alumni
- The New Yorker people
- Writers from Brooklyn
- Novelists from New York City
- Prix Femina Étranger winners
- American women academics