Name: Gish Jen (Chinese: 任碧莲)Gender: Female
Born: Long Island, New York
Occupation: Novelist
Nationality: American
Period: Current
Genres: Novel
Notable works:
Typical American
Mona in the Promised Land
The Love Wife
Who’s Irish?
Background
Gish Jen is a second generation Chinese American. Her parents emigrated from China in the 1940s, her mother from Shanghai and her father from Yixing. She grew up in Queens, NY, then Yonkers, then Scarsdale.
She graduated from Radcliffe College in 1977 with a BA in English, and later attended Stanford Business School, but dropped out in favor of the University of Iowa Writers’ Workshop. Where she earned her MFA in Fiction in 1982.
Honors and awards
- 2009 American Academy of Arts and Sciences, member
- 2006 PBS American Masters Program on the American Novel, featured writer
- 2003 Mildred and Harold Strauss Living Award from the American Academy of Arts and Letters
- 2003 Fulbright Fellowship to the People's Republic of China
- 2001 Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study Fellowship
- 1999 Best American Short Stories of the Century
- 1999 Lannan Literary Award
- 1995 Best American Short Stories of 1995
- 1992 Guggenheim Foundation Fellowship
- 1991 National Book Critics' Circle Award Finalist
- 1988 National Endowment for the Arts Fellowship
- 1988 Best American Short Stories of 1988
- 1986 Radcliffe College Bunting Institute Fellowship
Video Share
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p93mHPpF6Gw
Hello Chao 的博客: I really appreciated you timeline and the video you posted concerning the life efforts of Gish Jen. All of it really helped to put her life into perspective for me and this is why I have chosen to comment on your post. In 1999 her achievement of the Best American Short Stories of the Century is absolutely amazing. To me that award is the most admirable achievements she has. To think she was competing with short story writers such as Edgar Poe, Scott Fitzgerald, Ray Bradbury and my favorite, who is a little more moderate, Stephen King. This is a circle of Kings and she has definitely become first Queen.
ReplyDeleteProfessor Kulbaga seems to be fond of her as well, I found it fascinating when she made us aware of her real name being Lillian Jen. For the life of me I cannot seem to find on my voice record when she described the reason for changing her name. If I remember correctly, which I probably do not, she had changed it for comical reasons. Oh well, thank you for your biography of Gish Jen it has certainly given me a new prospective and a new respect for the author.
–STEVE-
I love her so much!
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