| Mona Simpson (novelist) | |
|---|---|
| Born | Mona Jandali June 14, 1957 Green Bay, Wisconsin, United States |
| Occupation | Novelist, English professor |
| Nationality | American |
| Alma mater | University of California, Berkeley Columbia University |
| Genres | American literature |
| Notable work(s) | Anywhere But Here (1986) The Lost Father (1992) A Regular Guy (1996) |
| Spouse(s) | Richard Appel (divorced) |
| Children | Gabriel Grace |
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www.monasimpson.com |
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Mona E. Simpson (born Mona Jandali[1], June 14, 1957) is an American author. She is a professor of English at the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) and the Sadie Samuelson Levy Professor in Languages and Literature at Bard College.[2][3] She won the Whiting Prize for her first novel, Anywhere but Here (1986). It was a popular success and adapted as a film by the same name, released in 1999. Her novel Off Keck Road (2000) won the Chicago Tribune Heartland Prize, and was a finalist for the PEN/Faulkner Award. She is also the biological younger sister of the late Steve Jobs, whom she did not meet until she was 25 years old.[4]
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Mona Jandali was born in Green Bay, Wisconsin in 1957 and grew up in Los Angeles, California.[1] Her father Abdulfattah "John" Jandali, originally from Syria,[1] taught at the University of Wisconsin. Her mother Joanne Carole Schieble was his student; however, they were the same age because Jandali had "gotten his PhD really young."[1] Later he made a career in the food and beverage industry. Schieble became a speech language pathologist.[5] They divorced in 1962[6] and Jandali lost touch with Mona.[4] Joanne remarried and Mona was given the last name of her stepfather, Simpson.[1]
Simpson received her B.A. from the University of California, Berkeley, and her M.F.A. from Columbia University. After graduating from Columbia, she worked as an editor for Paris Review. In 1994, she returned to Los Angeles with her husband.[2] In 2001, she started teaching creative writing at UCLA, and also has an appointment at Bard College in New York.[2]
Simpson's novels are a mixture of events from her life and pure fiction.[7][8][1] Her first novel, Anywhere But Here (1986), was a critical and popular success, winning the Whiting Prize. It was adapted as the 1999 film, Anywhere But Here, starring Susan Sarandon and Natalie Portman.[9] A Regular Guy (1996) explores the strained relationship of a Silicon Valley tycoon with a daughter born out of wedlock, whom he did not acknowledge.[7][8] Off Keck Road (2000), portraying decades in the lives of three women in the Midwest, was a finalist for the PEN/Faulkner Award and won the Chicago Tribune Heartland Prize. Stacey D'Erasmo states that "Off Keck Road marks the place where origin leaves off and improvisation begins."[10]
Simpson's most recent novel, My Hollywood, was published in 2011. It explores the complex relationships, issues of class, and perspectives of two women, a European-American composer and mother in her 30s, and her immigrant nanny from the Philippines, who cares for her son and has five of her own in the Philippines whom she is supporting. The novel alternates between the voices of the two women, contrasting their worlds. Liesl Schillinger suggests that the novel is a "compassionate fictional exploration of this complicated global relationship, Simpson assesses the human cost that the child-care bargain exacts on the amah, on her employer and on the children of both."[11] Ron Charles further argues that:
What really invigorates this novel, though, is the way it alternates between Claire's chapters and chapters narrated by Lola, her 50-year-old Filipino nanny. I was worried early on that Lola would be a Southeast Asian version of the Magical Negro, who exists merely to help some self-absorbed white person reach enlightenment. But she's entirely her own wonderful, troubled character, and her relationship with Claire remains complex and unresolved.[12]
Abdulfattah "John" Jandali and Joanne Carole Schieble had a baby boy in 1955 prior to both their marriage and Mona's birth, but gave him up for adoption. The boy, computer pioneer Steve Jobs, was adopted by Paul and Clara Jobs.[8] In the 1980s, Jobs found his birth mother, by then Joanne Simpson, who told him that Mona was his biological sister. The siblings met for the first time in 1985[4] and developed a close friendship. They kept their relationship secret until 1986, when Simpson introduced Jobs as her brother at her book party for her first novel, Anywhere But Here. The two forged a relationship and he regularly visited her in Manhattan. Simpson said, "My brother and I are very close; I admire him enormously." Jobs said, "We're family. She's one of my best friends in the world. I call her and talk to her every couple of days."[8]
Simpson had already been looking for their father and found him, then managing a coffee shop. When she reached Jandali, he said, "'I wish you could have seen me when I was running a bigger restaurant.'"[13] Jandali told Simpson that he had once managed a popular Mediterranean restaurant in Silicon Valley. "'Everybody used to come there,'" the Jobs biographer, Walter Isaacson, says Jandali told Simpson. "'Even Steve Jobs used to eat there. Yeah, he was a great tipper.'"[13]
In a taped interview aired on 60 Minutes, Jobs said: "When I was looking for my biological mother, obviously, you know, I was looking for my biological father at the same time, and I learned a little bit about him and I didn't like what I learned. I asked her (Mona) to not tell him that we ever met...not tell him anything about me."[13]
In her eulogy to Jobs (published in the New York Times on October 30, 2011), Simpson stated:
In 1993, Simpson married the television writer and producer Richard Appel[14] and they had two children together, Gabriel and Grace.[15] Appel, a writer for The Simpsons, used his wife's name for Homer Simpson's mother, beginning with the episode "Mother Simpson".[16] They later divorced.
Simpson lives in Santa Monica with her two children.[17]