Claire Messud

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Claire Messud (born 1966) is an American novelist.

Contents

[edit] Background

Born in Toulon, France (like her sister), Messud grew up in the United States, Australia and Canada, returning to the US as a teenager. Messud's mother is Canadian, her father of French origin (from formerly-French Algeria), and her sister is French. The writer was educated at Milton Academy, Yale University and then Cambridge, where she met her spouse, the British critic James Wood. Messud also briefly attended the MFA program at Syracuse University.

[edit] Career

Her debut novel, When The World Was Steady (1995), was nominated for the PEN/Faulkner Award. In 1999, she published her second book, The Last Life, about three generations of a French-Algerian family. Her 2001 work, The Hunters, consists of two novellas. Her most recent novel, The Emperor’s Children, was longlisted for the 2006 Man Booker Prize. She wrote the novel while a fellow at the Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study in 2004-2005. [1]

[edit] Honors

The American Academy of Arts and Letters has recognized Messud's talent with both an Addison Metcalf Award and a Strauss Living Award. She was considered for the 2003 Granta Best of Young British Novelists list, although none of the three passports she holds is British [2].

[edit] Teaching

Messud has taught creative writing at Kenyon College, Amherst College, in the Warren Wilson College MFA Program for Writers in North Carolina, and in the Graduate Writing program at Johns Hopkins University.

[edit] Personal

Messud is married to the New Yorker Magazine literary critic James Wood. They live in Washington, D.C., and Somerville, Massachusetts, with their two children.

[edit] Works

[edit] References