Cheryl Strayed

Cheryl Strayed
Cheryl Strayed at the Texas Book Festival, 2012
Born	(1968-09-17) September 17, 1968 Spangler, Pennsylvania
Occupation	Writer
Language	English
Citizenship	United States
Subjects	memoir, fiction
Notable work(s)	Torch, Tiny Beautiful Things: Advice on Love and Life from Dear Sugar, Wild: From Lost to Found on the Pacific Crest Trail

Cheryl Strayed (née Nyland) (born September 17, 1968) is an American memoirist, novelist and essayist. Her second book, Wild: From Lost to Found on the Pacific Crest Trail was published in the United States by Alfred A. Knopf on March 20, 2012 and has been translated into twenty-eight languages. It debuted at No. 7 on the "New York Times Best Seller list" in hardcover nonfiction and on July 15, 2012, it reached No. 1 and held that spot for seven consecutive weeks.^[1] In June 2012, Oprah Winfrey announced that Wild was her first selection for her new Oprah's Book Club 2.0. The actress Reese Witherspoon optioned Wild for film before it was published, with plans to star in the production as Strayed.

In 2010 Strayed began writing the "Dear Sugar" advice column for the literary web site The Rumpus. The column grew a fervent online following and in July 2012 a collection of the columns was published by Vintage Books as Tiny Beautiful Things: Advice on Love and Life from Dear Sugar. It debuted at No. 5 on the "New York Times Best Seller list" in the advice and self-help category and has also been published internationally.

Strayed's first book, the novel Torch, was published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt in February 2006 to positive critical reviews.^[2] "Torch" was a finalist for the Great Lakes Book Award and selected by The Oregonian as one of the top ten books of 2006 by writers living in the Pacific Northwest.^[3] In October 2012, "Torch" was re-issued by Vintage Books with a new introduction by Strayed.

Strayed's personal essays have been published widely in national magazines and journals and have twice been selected for inclusion in The Best American Essays. She won a Pushcart Prize for her essay "Munro Country," which first appeared in the Missouri Review.^[4]

Personal life

Strayed was born in Spangler, Pennsylvania, the middle child of three children. At age five, she moved with her family to Chaska, Minnesota. Her parents divorced a year later. At age 13, she moved with her mother, stepfather and two siblings to rural Aitkin County, where they lived in a house that they had built themselves on 40 acres. The house did not have electricity or running water for the first few years. Indoor plumbing was installed after Strayed moved away for college.

In 1986, at age 17, Strayed graduated from McGregor High School in McGregor, Minnesota, where she was a track and cross country runner, cheerleader, and homecoming queen. She loosely based the fictional Coltrap County in her novel Torch on McGregor and Aitkin County. Strayed attended her freshman year of college at the University of St. Thomas in St. Paul, but by her sophomore year, she transferred to the University of Minnesota in Minneapolis, where she received her Bachelor of Arts degree, graduating magna cum laude with a double major in English and Women's Studies. In March 1991, when Strayed was a senior in college, her mother, Bobbi Lambrecht, died suddenly of lung cancer at age 45. Strayed has described this loss as her "genesis story". She has written about her mother's death and her grief in each of her books and several of her essays.^[5]

Strayed worked as a waitress, youth advocate, political organizer, temporary office employee, and emergency medical technician ^[6] throughout her 20s and early 30s, while writing and often traveling around the United States. In 2002, she earned a Master of Fine Arts in fiction writing from Syracuse University,^[6] where she was mentored by writers George Saunders, Arthur Flowers, Mary Gaitskill, and Mary Caponegro.

In 1999, Strayed married filmmaker Brian Lindstrom. They have two children and live in Portland, Oregon.^[7]

A long-time feminist activist, Strayed serves on the board of directors for VIDA: Women in Literary Arts.^[8]

Writing background

In addition to her books Wild, Tiny Beautiful Things, and Torch, Strayed has published essays in various magazines, including The Washington Post Magazine, The New York Times Magazine, Vogue, Allure, The Missouri Review, and The Sun Magazine.^[8] Her work has been selected twice for inclusion in The Best American Essays ("Heroin/e" in the 2000 edition, and "The Love of My Life" in the 2003 edition). She has also won a Pushcart Prize for her essay, "Munro Country," which was originally published in The Missouri Review.^[4] The essay is about a letter Strayed received from Alice Munro, when she was a young writer and Munro's influence on Strayed's writing.^[9]

Strayed writes the popular advice column "Dear Sugar" on The Rumpus.^[10] She began writing the column in March 2010, when the column's originator Steve Almond asked her to take over for him.^[11] She wrote the column anonymously until February 14, 2012, when she revealed her identity as "Sugar" at a party at the Verdi Club in San Francisco.^[10][12][13] A selection of her columns have been collected in her book Tiny Beautiful Things.

Her memoir, Wild: From Lost to Found on the Pacific Crest Trail details her 1,100-mile hike on the Pacific Crest Trail from the Mojave Desert to the Oregon-Washington border and also tells the story of the personal struggles that compelled her to take the hike.^[14] Three months before her memoir was published, the actress Reese Witherspoon optioned it for her company, Pacific Standard.^[12][15] Nick Hornby is adapting Wild for the screen, with Witherspoon scheduled to star as Strayed.^[16]

In June 2012, Wild was chosen as the inaugural selection for Oprah's Book Club 2.0, which is a relaunch of Oprah's Book Club, which ended in 2011. Oprah's Book Club 2.0 uses online social media such as Facebook and Twitter. Winfrey discussed Wild in her video announcement of the new club. Winfrey interviewed Strayed for a two-hour broadcast of her show Super Soul Sunday on her OWN Network.^[17]

Published works

• Strayed, Cheryl (2006). Torch, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 336 pages. ISBN 978-0618472178
• Strayed, Cheryl (2012). Wild: From Lost to Found on the Pacific Crest Trail, Knopf, 336 pages. ISBN 978-0307592736
• Strayed, Cheryl (2012). Tiny Beautiful Things: Advice on Love and Life from Dear Sugar, Vintage Books, 368 pages. ISBN 978-0307949332
• Strayed, Cheryl (2012). Torch, reissue with new introduction by the author, Vintage Contemporaries, 432 pages. ISBN 978-0345805614

References

External links

• Official website
• "Dear Sugar" advice column
• Cheryl Strayed reviews and links on Biographile
• "Munro County" published in the The Missouri Review
• The Most Inspiring Quotes from Wild Oprah.com