About
Lydia Davis is an American writer born in 1947 in Massachusetts. She is known for her extremely brief and experimental short stories, often reduced to a single sentence or paragraph. She has also translated many French authors, including Proust and Flaubert. Her Collected Stories (2009) solidified her reputation. She received the Man Booker International Prize in 2013 and a MacArthur Fellowship in 2003. She taught at the University at Albany (SUNY) and lives in New York State.
* 1947-07-15
Major works
- The Thirteenth Woman and Other Stories (1976)short story collection
- Break It Down (1986)short story collection
- The End of the Story (1995)novel
- Collected Stories (2009)short story collection
- Can't and Won't (2014)short story collection
Key milestones
- 2003Receives the MacArthur Fellowship (Genius Grant)
- 2013Wins the Man Booker International Prize
- 2020Receives the PEN/Malamud Award for Excellence in the Short Story
Themes
brevity and experimental formeveryday life and its absurditieslanguage and communicationtranslation and intertextualityisolation and human relationships
Sources: id.loc.gov · poetryfoundation.org · britannica.com