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Home , 2013 Pulitzer Prize, Alice Mayhew, Caroline Fraser, David McCullough, Dean King, John Matteson

MAY 17-19, 2019 BIOGRAPHER$1 ~ INTERNATIONAL. Hl, CONFERENCE 1\IEW YORK CIT'lf 1 -'o.. ;., - . " ' BIOCRA 'IIER~ INTIRNAIIONAL URtjANI/AJION

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..•...... •...... _ . . . . ' . . ,...... •·.•·· .. .. .•• .._ • . •. .•.. • • .• ...... t ...... • •.•• . . . . ,._ .. .•..•.. . •.. .. •...... •..•.... .•...... THE 2019 PLUTARCH AWARD The 2019 BIO Award Recipient:. Biographers International Organization is proud to present the Plutarch James McGrath Morris ,_ Award for the best biography of 2018, as chosen by our members. James McGrath Morris first fell in love with biography as a child reading newspaper obituaries. In fact, his steady

"? , ".:-r--.: >·(..'._ ,r.,. history in 2015; and The Ambulance Drivers: Hemingway, Dos Passos, and a Friendship Made and Lost in War. He is also the author of two Kindle Singles, The Radio Operator and Murder by Revolution. AFTER EMILY ·v"' In 2016, he taught literary journalism at Texas A&M, and he has conducted writing workshops at various . , T•o Rcnurbbk.\l:'omcn. _ , ./, ~nd1hcLcgxyof­ colleges, universities, and conferences. He is the progenitor of the idea for BIO and was among the found­ ,\in,:nça',:Grl:..1t<:s1 Poc-1 . ers as well as a past president. Morris is currently working on a biography of Tony Hillerman, the late au­ ~' thor of groundbreaking mysteries set in the Navajo Nation. He makes his home in Santa Fe, New Mexico.

JULIE DOBRO\Y1 _.,, BIO Officers Irwin Gellman Ruth Franklin Susan Quinn ~ Annette Gordon-Reed Nigel Hamilton Will Swift ~: Cathy Curtis, President ...... -..,.. Js ... s,..:e..- , Deirdre David, Michael Holroyd Marc Leepson Amanda Vaill __,. ;,;,.., ,.,, .,. r _..._., ,,_.,.;...,,,...- ,:;, f!",_ .,,...,, • Vice President Eric Lax Pamela Newkirk Marc Leepson, Karin Roffman Caro Fellowship Treasurer Andrew Lownie Justin Spring Committee THE IMPRDB4BLE Dean King, Secretary Deirdre David, Chair WENDELL Conference Site Board of Directors Alice Mayhew Committee Marc Leepson WILLKIE Deirdre David, Chair 1' 11 1; RIJS J"l ESSM,\ N WII O S,\\'Eh Deirdre David T II I; IIIW lJ ll l,ICA~ 1•,rnn ,\J\ 0 11 1S ( 0 UN 1'11 \'. Marion Meade Patricia Auspos Coaching Organizer John A. Farrell Andrew Morton Barbara Fisher Cathy Curtis Carla Kaplan Joanny Moulin John Richetti Kitty Kelley Arnold Rampersad Justin Spring Membership Sarah Kilborne Hans Renders Committee C Louise (Lucy) W. Knight BIO Award Committee Kitty Kelley, Chair ~ Linda Leavell Martin J. Sherwin Cathy Curtis, Chair .c:"' Heath Lee Deirdre David C Gayfryd Steinberg Publicity Committee <"' Anne Boyd Rioux T.J. Stiles Linda Leavell Billy Tooma, Co-Chair s Justin Spring Jean Strouse Carl Rollyson Steve Weinberg, -a; Billy Tooma Will Swift Co-Chair QJ Will Swift .... Mariene Trestman i'.:; Steve Weinberg Development cl.... Sonja Williams Terry Teachout !") C\J Ike Williams Rowley Prize Committee ~ Advisory Council Deirdre David, Co-Chair QJ Committee "":J , Chair Will Swift, Co-Chair C Conference Program Carla Kaplan, Chair \!; James Atlas Committee Sarah Kilborne "'( Taylor Branch Program Editor -E Linda Leavell, Co-Chair Dean King lJ) Douglas Brinkley Greg Daugherty i..: Anne Boyd Rioux, \!; Co-Chair Plutarch Award 0 Art Direction V Kai Bird .... Committee Fearless Future :J Tim Duggan Kate Buford Megan Marshall, Chair 0 Amanda Foreman C Greg Daugherty Peniel E. Joseph 0

~io:::,P.A~ ÛRGAN_ I_U._T_IÖ_N______Plenary Session Panels-Concourse Level of the Graduate Center ~

David Remnick, Stacy Schift, and Judith Thurman in conversation BASICS conference papers, and walking tours, and about whom she is always eager to answer questions. 8:15-9:15AM LOCATION PROSHANSKY AUDITORIUM Adventures in the Archives 9:30-10:30AM David Remnick has been the edi­ American Academy of Arts and Letters, she was named a CRAFT tor of since 1998. Library Lion of the . Schiff is at A nuts-and-bolts look at the joys and perils of archi­ The Art, Craft, and Market for His hooks include the Pulitzer work on a biography of Samuel Adams, to be published by val research. Topics to be addressed include plan­ Young Readers' Biographies Prize-winning Lenin's Tomb: The Little, Brown. ning research trips for maximum efficiency, building 9:30-10:30AM Last Days of the Soviet Empire; productive relationships with archivists and librar­ King of the World: Muhammad Ali Judith Thurman has been a staff ians, do's and don'ts of hiring research assistants, and A senior editor and three award-winning authors and the Rise of an American Hero; writer at The New Yorkersince 2000 share their knowledge of writing and editing biogra­ and The Bridge, a biography of and a contributor since 1987, spe­ using technology in the archival setting and on your Barack Obama. cializing in cultural criticism. She home computer. phies for young readers-from picture books and ju­ has written about Paleolithic cave veniles, to young adults. It is an opportunity to under­ Stacy Schift won the Pulitzer art; artisanal tofu in Japan; hy­ Moderator stand the similarities and differences between writing Prize in 2000 for Véra (Mrs. perpolyglots- people who speak for adults and younger readers (ages 4 to 18), regard­ Journalist and historian Marc Leepson is the author of Vladimir Nabokov). She is the au­ more than eleven languages; and ing craft elements such as subject choice, a slice-of-life thor as well of Saint-Exupéry, a about literature, film, photogra­ nine hooks. That includes SavingMonticello, Flag·AnAmerican vs. cradle-to-grave life story, archival research, and finalist for the , phy, translation, and performance Biography, and three biographies of humans: Lafayette: creating a narrative that engages the reader. and A Great Improvisation: Frank/in, art. From the short sketch of a hijabi designer in , Idealist General (2011), What So Proudly We Hailed· Francis , and the Birth of America, to the long profile of a kimono master in Kyoto, and a re­ Scott Key, A Lift (2014), and Ballad of the Green Beret: The Lift awarded the portage on the career of Yves Saint Laurent (a piece cho­ and Wars ofArmy Sgt. (2017). He has written for Moderator many magazines, newspapers, and reference hooks, includ­ Book Prize and the Ambassador sen for the "Best American Essays of 2003"), Thurman has Ray Anthony Shepard's debut young adult biography, ing the Encyclopedia Britannica and the Dictionary of Virginia Book Award. Her Cleopatra: A explored fashion as a cultural phenomenon. She is the au­ Now or Never! 54th Massachusetts Infantry's War to End , Biography. He was elected to BIO's board of directors in 2013 Lift has been translated into 30 languages and won the thor of !sak Dinesen: The Lift ofa Storyteller, which won the received star reviews from School Library Connection and and serves as the organization's treasurer. His website is PEN/Jacqueline Bograd Weld Award for Biography. David for nonfiction in 1983 and was the Kirkus, was listed by the New York Public Library as one of www.marcleepson.com. McCullough deemed Schiff's most recent book, The Witches: basis for Sydney Pollack's Oscar-winning film Out ofAfrica ; the Best Books of the Year for Teens, and named the Carter Salem 1692, "brilliant from start to finish ." Like Cleopatra, it Secrets of the Flesh: A Lift of Colette, which won the LosAngeles G. Woodson Honor Book by the National Council of Social was a No. 1 best seller. Times and Salon Book Awards for Biography in 1999; and Panelists Studies. Junior Library Guild and Scholastic Book Fairs se­ Cleopatra's Nose: 39 Varieties ofDesire , a collect ion of her New Ellen F. Brown is a lawyer and an award-winning free­ lected Now or Never! for their subscribers. Praised for her meticulous scholarship and her witty Yorker essays. style, Schiff has contributed frequently to the New York lance writer whose work has appeared in many print and Margaret Times op-ed page and Book Review, as Thurman's honors include the Harold D. Vursell Memorial online publications. She co-authored the book Panelists Mitchell's Gone W ith the Wind· A Bestseller's Odyssey /rom well as to many national publications. She has received fel­ Award for prose style from the American Academy of Tonya Bolden, author, co-author, or editor of more than Atlanta to Hollywood and is now working on a book about lowships from the Guggenheim Foundation, the National Arts and Letters; the Rungstedlund Prize from the Royal forty hooks, is a recipient of the Children's Book Guild literary estates. Brown holds an M.F.A. in nonfiction writ­ Endowment for the Humanities, and the Center for Danish Academy; and the 2019 Mary McCarthy Prize, from of Washington, D.C.'s Nonfiction Award for her body of ..: ing and also has worked as a rare book and manuscript Scholars and Writers at the New York Public Library. The Bard College, for the life's work of a woman writer. She is a work. That work includes the Coretta Scott King Honor ~ appraiser/dealer. She is a member of the National Book recipient of an Academy Award in Literature from the chevalier of the French Ordre des Arts et des Lettres. ..c: Book Maritcha: A Nineteenth-Century American Girl and Facing .S, Critics Circle and has served on the foundation boards of a:: Frederick: The Lift Frederick Douglass, A Monumental .._ the Library of Virginia and Swem Library at the College of of :; American Man, hailed as a 2018 best book for young people (.J William and Mary. .5' by Kirkus, School Library Journal, the Chicago Public Library, 2 Nancy Kuhl is curator of poetry for the Yale Collection of and . Bolden, who Jives in , t!J~.l!Ig,yborn 0 ..c: American Literature at Beinecke Library. She is the author graduated from magna cum laude and Q C: of exhibition catalogs including Intimate Circles: American has a master's degree from . Our 2019 Keynote Speakers: "' Wamen in the Arts, The Book Remembers Everything: The Work ê Deborah Heiligman is the author of 31 hooks. Her most :; ofEri ca Van Horn, and poetry collections including Pine to recent, Vincent and Theo: The Van Gogh Brothers, won the 111 t Sound, Suspend, and The Wift ofthe Left Hand. She is the cu­ Globe-Horn Book Award for nonfiction, the YALSA -s rator of Audubon at Beinecke. Additional information and 'o Excellence in Nonfiction Award, the SCBWI Golden Kite ...,:; examples of Kuhl's work can be found at www.phylumpress. . Award, and an ALA Michael L. Printz Honor. Charles and rl ~-.._ com/kuhl. Qi Emma: The Darwins' Leap of Faith, was a YALSA Excellence 1 Il Ham pton Sides :9 1WS1Dîi'i:i:"iii"i:li TMl'TP?û Mariam Touba is a longtime reference librarian for print­ in Nonfiction Award winner, a Printz Honor book, and a i.. The Nev,, ,rork Times Pulitzer Prize Bestselling author of .3\ 1 ed collections at the New-York Historical Society, special­ National Book Award finalist. The Boy Who Loved Math: The t-:~: :e. Magozine ·"· Winner "On Desperate Ground ' "'C: ~~\:~.,.... - Qi Improbable Lift of Paul Erdos won the Cook Prize, the Annie .:,,'. i:i:j izing in newspapers and in the Revolutionary period and . ~ ~~ ) Special Featured Speaker the Early Republic. She has assisted biographers, histori­ lzard Storytelling Award, and was an Obis Pictus Honor ( .5' Book. Heiligman Jives in New York City with her husband, .. · Margot Lee Shetterly - Author, HHidden Figures" 2 ans, architects, and genealogists in viewing library trea­ "- . ..J' 0 Jonathan Weiner. 111 ..c: sures and finding little-known facts. She included some of Q those facts as a contributor to When Did the Statue ofLiberty • REG ISTE R NOW: themayborn.com :t: Grace Elizabeth Kendall is senior editor, Farrar, Straus, r l i: Turn Green? And 101 Other Questions About New York City u V) Giroux Books for Young Readers/Macmillan. Kendall works 1 FRANK W. MAYBORN (Columbia University Press, 2010). Her main biographical in­ • GRAOUATE INSTITUTE on a wide range of material, from picture hooks to YA nov­ UNT OF JOURNAUSM G' terest is Thomas Paine, the subject of her exhibits, articles, ~ EST. 1890 V) els and biographies. She publishes projects from debut

~-~ ~-~ v' BIOGltAPHERS INTERNATIONAL ORGANIZATION V' BlOGlt\PHIRS INTERNATIONALÜRGA.NIZ.ATJON authors, seasoned veterans, and award winners, includ­ the advisory council of BIO and the advisory board of the Panelists BAS/CS ing Mama Africa! by National Book Award winner Kathryn Book Fair. Fire Up Your Narrative Erskine, illustrated by Coretta Scott King/John Steptoe New Alexis Coe is a historian and the author of Alice & Freda Talent Award winner Char\y Palmer; You Bring the Distant Katherine Flynn is a partner at the Kneerim & Williams Forever:A MurderinMemphis, (Pulp, 2014). Her next book, You 10:45-11:45AM Agency, which she joined in 2008. She previously taught Never Forget Your First: A Mostly Feminist Biography of George Near by Mitali Perkins, which was a Walter Honor Book, a Learn from a panel of prize-winning biographers literature and composition, edited history textbooks, Washington, will be published by Viking (Penguin/Random South Asia Book Award winner, and a National Book Award their best strategies for telling extraordinary stories. nominee; and Betty Before X by Ilyasah Shabazz and Renée worked in a rare bookshop, and pursued her B.A. from Johns House) in 2019. Coe's articles and commentary have been Watson. Kendall also publishes ongoing series, such as the Hopkins and Ph.D. in history from Brown. She serves on the widely published, including in The New Yorker, Pans Review, Topics will range from choosing a subject, to charac­ Jasmine Toguchi chapter books by Debbi Michiko Florence. Boston Book Festival board and as the publishing consul­ and New York Times Magazine. terization, to placing the subject in a historica! con­ @GraceKendallLit. tant for the Radcliffe Institute. Flynn represents best-sell­ text-with emphasis on the revision process. Members ing and prize-winning books in the categories of history, Shomari Wills is a journalist and the author of Black of this panel have received BIO's Plutarch Award, the Catherine Reef is the author, most recently, of Mary biography, current affairs, science, business, psychology, Fortunes: The Story of the First Six African Who Pulitzer Prize, the National Book Critics Circle Award, Escaped Slavery and Became Millionaires (HarperCollins, 2018). Shelley: The Strange True Tale of Frankenstein's Creator. Her sociology, and narrative nonfiction, as well as some literary the PEN Award, and other prestigious prizes. books include the highly acclaimed Florence Nightingale: The and commercial fiction. He has worked for CNN and on ABC TV's Good Morning Courageous Lift of the Legendary Nurse; Victoria: Portrait of a America, where he was part of an Emmy Award-winning pro­ Queen; The Brontë Sisters: The Brief Lives of Charlotte, Emily, Sarah Burnes became an agent in 2001 after stints at duction team. Moderator Houghton Miffiin, Knopf, and Little, Brown. Joining the and Anne; and Frida & Diego: Art, Love, Lift. She has received Linda Leave/1 is the author of Holding On Upside Down: The Gernert Company in 2005, she represents biographers, Heidi Ardizzone, Ph.D, is associate professor and chair of the Sydney Taylor Award, the Joan G. Sugarman Award, and Lift and Work ofMarianne Moore, which won the 2014 Plutarch critics, journalists, novelists, and children's fiction writ­ American Studies at . She is the au­ Jefferson Cup, Golden Kite, and National Jewish Book Award Award, the Moderni_st Studies Association book award, ers. Her clients have either won or been shortlisted for thor of An Illuminated Lift: Belle da Costa Greene'sjourney from honors. In addition, her titles consistently appear on lists of and the PEN Award. It was a finalist for the National Book the National Book Award, the National Book Critics Circle Prejudice to Privilege (W. W. Norton, 2007) and the co-au­ "best" and "notable" books. Reef lives and works in College Critics Circle Award and the Pegasus Award for Poetry Award, the Pulitzer Prize, and the First thor of Love on Trial: An American Scandal in Black and White, Park, Maryland. Criticism. She is also the author of Marianne Moore and the (W. W. Norton, 2002). Book Prize, and have received grants and fellowships from Visual Arts: Prismatic•Color, a book of literary criticism, and the Guggenheim Foundation, the Lannan Foundation, the INSPIRAT!ON for twenty-five years was a professor of American literature. Cullman Center, and the National Endowment for the Arts, Telling Life Stories in Her current project, under contract with Farrar, Straus and among others. Burnes sits on the board of the New Press and Giroux, is a group biography of the Stieglitz circle. These Chaotic Times lives with her husband and three children in Brooklyn, N.Y. 9:30-10:30AM INSPIRATION Panelists This panel will explore what is selling in today's com­ Hidden Figures John A. Farre/1 is the author ofRichard Nixon: The Lift, which plicated marketplace-and what is not. An editor, two 9:30-10:30AM won the PEN America award for the best biography, and the agents, and a biographer will also examine wheth­ New-York Historica! Society book prize for the best volume er the current publishing climate is inspiring more This panel explores the challenges biographers face in of American history, of 2017. It was a finalist for the Pulitzer creative responses to storytelling. They will come chronicling the lives of people who have been margin­ Prize. In 2001 Farrell published Tip O'Neill and the Democratie Century, which won the D. B. Hardeman Prize for the best prepared with any metrics they may have regarding alized or overlooked. Biographies on forgotten indi­ book on Congress. His book Clarence Darrow: Attorney far the the market, as well as their own anecdotes and in­ viduals are gaining more attention thanks to the suc­ Damned won the Los Angeles Times Book Prize for best bi­ sights about navigating their authors through these cess of books like Hidden Figures that reclaim stories ography of 2012. He has also earned a George Polk Award, challenging times. from the margins-or waste bins-of history. This Book design-cover & interior layout a Gerald R. Ford Prize, and Correspondents panel will explore works that illuminate the lives of honors for his coverage of the presidency. Moderator people who either lived in the shadows of the famous, · Responsive, mobile-friendly website like Belle da Costa Greene, who was the librarian for design & coding Ruth Frank/in is the author of Shirley Jackson: A Rather John A. Farre/1 is the author ofRichardNixon: The Lift, which Haunted Lift (2016), which won numerous awards, in­ J. P. Morgan; were brief media sensations, like Alice won the PEN America award for the best biography, and the Education-based marketing cluding the National Book Critics Circle Award for New-York Historica! Society book prize for the best volume Mitchell and Freda Ward, whose secret shocked the Biography and BIO's Plutarch Award, and was named of American history, of 2017. It was a finalist for the Pulitzer nation during an 1892 murder trial; or were invisible, a New York Times Notable Book of 2016. Her essays and re­ Prize. In 2001 Farrell published Tip O'Neill and the Democratie like six African Americans who escaped slavery and views appear in many publications, including The New Century, which won the D. B. Hardeman Prize for the best became millionaires. The authors on this panel will 9J & fl> t Yorker, the New York Times Book Review, the New York Times book on Congress. His book Clarence Darrow: Attorney far the offer guidance on resurrecting the lives of the forgot­ Magazine, andHarper's. She is the recipient of a Guggenheim Damned won the Los Angeles Times Book Prize for best bi­ &a a Fellowship in biography, a Cullman Fellowship at the New ten through research and writing. ography of 2012. He has also earned a George Polk Award, York Public Library, a Leon Levy Fellowship in biography, a Gerald R. Ford Prize, and White House Correspondents / Moderator JJ- : '.I• ~ . "l- & :...•' -~& tl:t and the Roger Shattuck Prize for Criticism. honors for his coverage of the presidency. BITE·SIZED Pamela Newkirk, Ph.D., is professor of journalism at New lW1:-~f ~. MARKETING Caroline Fraser is the author of three works of non fiction, ...,.htl, wl,;tt-t••M•-"'•'11.....i• including Prairie Fires: The American Dreams ofLaura Ingalls Panelists York University and the author most recently of Spectacle: N- o..._,_,,____ The Astonishing Lift of Ota Benga, (Amistad, 2015). The book i,if la □. Wilder. One of the New York Times Ten Best Books of the Year Tim Duggan is the publisher of Tim Duggan Books, an in 2017, Prairie Fires won the Pulitzer Prize for Biography, a imprint at Penguin . The authors he has was listed among the Best Books of 2015 by NPR, and the Chronicle and won the NAACP National Book Critics Circle Award, BIO's Plutarch Award, worked with include Timothy Snyder, Daniel Mendelsohn, https://ff.design and the 's Heartland Prize for nonfiction. Michiko Kakutani, Michael Kinsley, Annie Dillard, Adam Image Award for Best Nonfiction Literature. Her forthcom­ Fraser's writing has appeared in The New Yorker, The New Begley, and A. Scott Berg. His books include winners of the ing book, Diversity, Ine., will be published by Bold Type in fall 2019. York Review of Books, and The Atlantic, among other pub­ Pulitzer Prize and the National Book Critics Circle Award lications. She holds a Ph.D. in literature from Harvard and multiple finalists for the National Book Award. He is a University and lives in Santa Fe, New Mexico. fellow at the New York Institute for the Humanities at NYU, a member of the Council on Foreign Relations, and is on . ~-~ (C,---'°)•--. - . v' BlóGRAPHf;RS INTERNATIONAL ORGANlZATION " BlqGRAP!ftRS INTEP.NATtONAL ORGANlZJJJ0N ------

:, 's biographies have focused on historica! outsid­ them started on their work despite lacking an academ­ at the New York Times, where he was most recently fea­ extreme experience with mundane reality." Kaag's American ers who navigated moments of global upheaval and risked ie affiliation. tures editor of T Magazine. His articles have also appeared Philosophy: A Love Story was a New York Times Editors' Choice everything to avoid betraying their ideals. His most recent in State, Esquire, Travel & Leisure, Departures, Vogue, and W. for 2016. book, The Black Count: Glory, Revolution, Betrayal and the Real Count ofMonte Cristo, won the and the Moderator Norm Hirschy is a senior editor in the Academie and Trade Beverly Lowry was born in Memphis, Tennessee, and grew 2013 PEN Award. His previous book, The Orientalist, about Justin Spring has written three biographies: Fairfield Division at Oxford University Press, where he acquires in up in Greenville, Mississippi. In addition to Her Dream of a Jew who transformed himself into a Muslim prince and a Porter: A Lift in Art ( Press, 1999); Secret music, dance, film, and cultural biography. He has published Dreams, The Rise and Triumph of Madam C. J Walker, she is best-selling author in Na zi Germany, was a finalist for the Historian: The Lift and Times ofSamuel Steward {Farrar, Straus biographies by Cathy Curtis, Peter Filkins, Vincent Giroud, the author of six novels and three other books oL.non­ 2006 Samuel Johnson Prize. He has written for The New and Giroux, 2011), and The Gourmands' Way: Six Americans in Nadine Meisner, Howard Pollack, Kathleen Riley, Sjeng fiction: Harriet Tubman, Imagining a Lift; Crossed Over: A Yorker, the Wal! Street journal, and the New York Times. His Paris and the Birth of a New Gastronomy (FSG, 2017). Spring's Scheijen, and Edmund Gordon, whose The Invention ofAngela Murder, a Memoir; and Who Ki/led These Girls? Cold Case: the qooks have been translated into more than 25 languages. other writings on 20th century American art and cul­ Carter: A Biography was named a National Book Cri tics Circle Yogurt Shop Murders. The recipient of an NEA Fellowship, a ture include monographs, museum publications, and ex­ Award Finalist and aNew York Times Notable Book. Guggenheim Fellowship, and a grant from the Rockefeller CRAFT hibition catalogs, as well as articles in Artfarum, the Village Foundation, she has published works of fiction and nonfic­ Geoff Burrows is a senior program officer at the National Voice, the New York Times, and the Wal! Streetjournal, among tion in many periodicals, including The New Yorker. She Jives Funding Primary and Archival Research Endowment for the Humanities, where he works with other publications. His biographies have been support­ in Austin, Texas. 10:45-11:45AM Fellowship Programs at Independent Research Institutions. ed by a Guggenheim Fellowship, a Leon Levy Fellowship, He is a historian of Latin America and the Caribbean whose /mani Perry is the Hughes-Rogers Professor of African and by various library fellowships at colleges, universities, One of the greatest challenges to both the aspiring research has focused on Puerto Rico, the New Deal, and U.S. American Studies at Princeton University, where she is and public institutions throughout the , in­ and the experienced biographer is locating and gain­ relations with Latin America. He holds a Ph.D. from the also affiliated with the Program in Gender and Sexuality cluding Harvard, Yale, Brown, Amherst, and University of ing access to crucial source material-particularly if CUNY Graduate Center, an M.A. from Hunter College, and a Studies and the Program in Law and Public Affairs. A schol­ Texas, Austin. that material is held by an archive far away, or if it re­ B.A. from UC Berkeley. Prior to coming to NEH, he taught at ar of Iegal history, cultural and literary studies, Perry is mains in private hands. Since publishers will only pay Panelists a variety of New York City-area colleges and universities. He the author of five books, including the 2018 biography of an advance for a biography after receiving a detailed Jives with his wife and daughters in Washington, O.C. Lorraine Hansberry: Lookingfor Lorraine. Perry Jives in the proposal for the book, this challenge is both financial Stephen Heyman is at work on the first major biography Philadelphia area with her two sons. INSPIRATION and logistical. Our panel will look at various ways in of the American author, conservationist, and pioneering or­ ganic farmer Louis Bromfield {1896 -1956), to be published INSP/RATION which biographers outside of academia have managed Biography in Search of lts Subject by W. W. Norton. He is currently a residential fellow at the International ldentities to initiate and pursue primary and archival research, 10:45-11:45AM Leon Levy Center for Biography at the CUNY Graduate 10:45-11:45AM either by financing these early stages themselves, or Center. He is also the recipient of a 2018 Public Scholar From A. J. A Symons's The Quest for Corvo to Ruth by applying to various institutions that can help get grant from the National Endowment for the Humanities. Scurr's John Aubrey: My Own Lift and Jill Lepore's joe Biography plays an important role in the way a coun­ Before beginning his book project, Heyman was on staff Gould's Teeth, distinguished biographers have been try deals with its national past. The narrative of bi­ pursuing their essentially elusive or ephemeral sub­ ography tends to be modeled after that of "nation­ jects openly, passionately, with all the scant evidence al heroes." In recent polities, national figures such as of the subjects' inner and outer lives brought forth President Juan Domingo Perón in Argentina, King INTRODUCING BIO'S NEW PODCAST and arranged for readers to see and follow. When is Leopold in Belgium, President Paul Kruger in South the search the story? And what sometimes makes the Africa, and Stadtholder William of Orange in Holland 'BIO's free weekly podcast series features insightful interviews with some of today's leading biog­ unstitched garment so compelling? have been reintroduced to start a debate about the raphers. You can download the podcast from the BIO website (biographersinternational.org/pod­ identity and mythology of a society. This debate is re­ flected in biography. A society needs myths to give casts/) or from the Apple iTunes store. Fresh episodes (about 20 minutes each) are added each week. Moderator meaning to the identity of an individual. In this panel, Anne C. Heller's Ayn Rand and the World She Made (Nan Your hosts are accomplished biographers themselves: Lisa Napoli, author of Ray &]aan: The Man Who it is our aim to unravel a mythology behind nationalist Talese/Doubleday, 2009) was a New York Times Notable Made the McDonald's Fortune and the Woman Who Gave lt All Away, and Sonja D. Williams, author of Book and was chosen a best book of the year by Time maga­ tendencies in biography. Word Warrior: Richard Durham, Radio, and Freedom. Their recent and upcoming guests include: zine, the Chicago Tribune, and others. Her most recent book is HannahArendt: A Lift in Dark Times, published by Harcourt Moderator • James Atlas, The Shadow in the Garden: A Biographer's Tale Houghton Miffiin in 2015. She has been an award-winning Hans Renders directs the Biography Institute, Groningen • Alan Pel! Crawford, How Not to Get Rich: The Financial Misadventures ofMark Twain editor at magazines including Esquire, Lear's, and Condé University, where he is professor of history and theory of Nast Publications, and is managing director of the New • Cathy Curtis,A Generous Vision: The Creative Lift ofE!aine de Kooning biography, which he teaches. He is editor-in-chief of the se­ York University Biography Seminar. She is at work on a • Anthony DeCurtis,LouReed·ALift ries Biography Studies, board chair of Het Biografisch Portaal third book about the life and times of a fierce twentieth­ • John A. Farrell, : The Lift van Nederland, a board member of De Nederlandse Biografie • Caroline Fraser, Prairie Fires: The American Dreams ofLaura Inga/Is Wilder century woman of ideas. Prijs, and a former BIO board member. He publishes wide­ • Beverly Gray, Seduced by Mrs. Robinson: How The Graduate Became the Touchstone ofa Generation ly on theory and biography, including Theoretica/Approaches • Bruce Kennett, WA. Dwiggins: A Lift in Design Panelists to Biography (2014) and The Biographical Turn, Lives in History • Van da Krefft, The Man Who Made the Movies: The Meteoric Rise and Tragic Fall ofWilliam Fox John Kaag is professor and chair of philosophy at the (2017). He also broadcasts regularly on radio. He has writ­ • Marc Leepson, Ballad ofthe Green Beret: The Lift and Wars ofArmy Sgt. Barry Sadler University of Massachusetts Lowell and the 2019 Miller ten Jives of Jan Hanlo and Jan Campert, is co-author of The ABC ofModern Biography, and is now tackling the artist Theo • Catherine Reef, Mary Shelley: The Strange T'rue Tale ofFrankenstein's Creator Scholar at the Santa Fe Institute. He is author of the criti­ van Doesburg. • Karin Roffman, The Songs We Know Best:johnAshbery's Early Lift cally acclaimed Hiking with Nietzsche: On Becoming Who You Are, which was a 2018 NPR Best Book of the Year. The New • Laurie Gwen Shapiro, TheStowaway:A YoungMan 'sExtraordinaryAdventuretoAntarctica Yorker writes that, "In this engagingly unacademic medita­ Panelists • Ray Anthony Shepard, Naw or Never! 54th Massachusetts Jnfantry's War to End Slavery tion, [Kaag] interweaves Friedrich Nietzsche's biography Lindie Koorts is a South African biographer. She is a se- · • William Taubman, Gorbachev: His Lift and Times with accounts of his own visits to Sils-Maria, in the Swiss nior lecturer at the International Studies Group, University Alps. [He] writes of reconciling a hunger for meaningful, of the Free State, and holds a Newton Adva_nced Fellowship

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BASICS Patricia R. Eisemann is a vice president and' executive di­ from the British Academy for her ongoing biographical re­ extensively on gender, memory, women's literature, and Promoting Your Biography: rector of-publicity at Henry Holt, where she oversees the search on Paul Kruger, the president of the Transvaal at the Jewish culture in Latin America. She has published several A Talk With the Experts media roll-opt for approximately 60 hardcover books year­ time of the South African wa·r. Her biography of D. F. Malan, academie books, including Wamen in Argentina, Early Travel ly by many prominent and best-selling authors, including the man who instituted the policy of apartheid, was the first Narratives; the Dictionary of Latin American Cultural Studies, 3:15-4:lSPM Hilary Mantel, Bill O'Reilly, Michael Wolff, Rick Atkinson, comprehensive biography of an apartheid leader to have Sitios de la memoria: México después del '68, and the Cambridge Sen. Elizabeth Warren, Roger Daltrey, and Andy C6hen. been published after the country's turn to democracy in History ofLatin American Women 's Literature. Her essays and After you've completed the hard work of writing your Before Holt, she was with the New York Times for six years 1994. The book was shortlisted for South Africa's foremost reviews have appeared in newspapers and magazines in book, how can you ensure that it finds an audience? in the corporate communications department, working nonfiction awards, including Alan Paton Argentina and Mexico. La vocación desmesurada: Una biografia What does it mean to have an "author platform," and with journalists on breaking news and daily stories. She also shortlist, and the KykNET-Rapport shortlist for nonfiction. de Alberto Gerchunoff, her biography of Jewish-Argentinean how do you develop one? This panel of experts-a spent twenty-five years at Simon & Schuster, including ten writer, journalist, and diplomat Alberto Gerchunoff, was publicity director, two marketing specialists, and a at Scribner, where she launched the media for Angela'sAshes Eric Palmen is chief editor of Biografieportaal, a review site published in 2018 by Penguin Random House. successful self-published author-will discuss con­ by Frank McCourt, Barbara Bush's memoir, and The Shipping for Dutch biographies. He has published two micro histo­ crete strategies and best practices for what works and News by Annie Proulx, among other best sellers. ries about the Dutch Republic. In Dwaze Liefde he deals with David Veltman is a Ph .D. student at the Biography the concepts of love and marriage during the seventeenth Institute, Groningen University, working on a biography what doesn't, including marketing via social media Kenneth Gillett is the principal and founder of Target and eighteenth century, from the perspective of a family of the Flemish artist Felix de Boeck (1898-1995). Together 1 and email, placing op-eds and features in newspapers Marketing Digital, a full-service digital marketing agency history of four generations. Kaat Mossel is the portrait of a with Hans Renders and Madelon Franssen, he organized the ,! and magazines, arranging author readings, and other based in New York City that works with brands, mission­ woman in Rotterdam during the revolution of 1781-1787. She widely acclaimed 2018 conference Different Lives: Global methods (new and time-tested) for getting books into driven thought leaders, and experts to advance ideas that was a fierce opponent of the so-called "patriots" who were Perspectives on Biography in Public Cultures and Societies. readers' hands. matter. Gillett has been building some of the most recog­ inspired by the . At the moment, he is Veltman has a master's degree in Dutch modern literature ni zable brands since 2003 and works with authors to in­ working on a biography of Janus van Domburg (1895-1983), and is a specialist on Belgian twentieth century biography. Moderator crease their visibility and achieve tangible results for their a film critic who was a passionate advocate of the art film in After graduating in 2005, he worked for eight years in the brand. While Gillett has worked with hundreds of best-sell­ the Netherlands. Dutch auction house Bubb Kuyper. He is also a freelance Ruth Franklin is the author of Shirley Jackson: A Rather ing authors, his team at Target Marketing Digital has most reporter for the Dutch artists' magazines Atelier and kM Haunted Lift (2016), which won numerous awards, in­ recently designed and led the digital campaigns for notable Mónica Szurmuk is professor of literature and cultural (Artist's Material). cluding the National Book Critics Circle Award for authors such as Hillary Clinton, Ray Dalio, , studies at the University of Buenos Aires. She has written Biography and BIO's Plutarch Award, and was named Glenn Beek, Howard Marks, Tucker Carlson, Facebook a New York Times Notable Book of 2016. Her essays and re­ co-founder Chris Hughes, Tony Robbins, and business views appear in many publications, including The New greats, such as Tom Peters, Marshall Goldsmith, Marcus Yorker, the New York Times Book Review, the New York Times Buckingham, Tim Ferriss, and Jim Collins. To learn more, Magazine, andHarper's. She is the recipient of a Guggenheim connect with Gillett on Twitter @TargetMktng or visit tar­ Fellowship in biography, a Cullman Fellowship at the New getmktng.com. York Public Library, a Leon Levy Fellowship in biography, Round-Table Discussions and the Roger Shattuck Prize for Criticism. Melinda M. Ponder is the author of Katharine Lee Bates: 12:00-1:30PM From Sea to Shining Sea, a life-and-times biography of the Panelists Wellesley College politica! activist, globetrotter, protégé of Please serve yourself lunch from the buffet and then find your assigned table in the Concourse. Longfellow, mentor of Robert Frost, and poet of "America Dan Blank is the founder of WeGrowMedia, where he The round-table topics are arranged by number. Unnumbered tables are reserved for those the Beautiful." She has published two books and numer­ helps writers create meaningful connections with their au­ ous essays and articles on Nathaniel Hawthorne and other not wishing to participate in a round table. Space is limited at all tables, so you may not dience. He is the author of Be the Gateway: A Practical Guide American and British authors in Genre, the Chicago Tribune, choose a topic other than the one for which you registered. Hosts' names are in parentheses. to Sharing Your Creative Work and Engaging an Audience. He the Essex Institute Historica! Collections, the Christian Science has worked with hundreds of writers as well as organiza­ Monitor, and the Nathaniel Hawthorne Review, and has given tions that support creative people, such as Penguin Random 1. American polities (John A. Farrell) 14. Organizing research (James more than fifty talks and media interviews on her new biog­ House, Sesame Workshop, Hachette Book Group, Workman raphy. An active member of the Boston Biographers Group, 2. American history I (Kai Bird) McGrath Morris) Publishing, J. Walter Thompson, Abrams Books, Writers she understands the value of learning from and supporting American history II (Louise Knight) 15. Families, estates, and permissions 3. House, the Kenyon Review, Writer's Digest, Library]ournal, and other biographers. Her website is www.melindaponder.com. 4. Military history (Marc Leepson) (Ellen F. Brown) many others. You can find Blank at http://WeGrowMedia. 5. Women's history (Patricia Brady) 16. The genre of biography (Nigel com or on Twitter and Instagram at @DanBlank. 6. Feminist biography (Elaine Showalter) Hamilton and Hans Renders) 7. Women's literary biography 17. Group biography (Joseph Esposito) (Megan Marshall) 18. Global figures (Kavita Das) 8. American literary biography 19. Lesser-known figures (James Atlas) (Barbara Lehman Smith) !' 9. Literary biography (Karin Roffman) 20. Race in biography (Sonja D. Williams) 10. First-time biographers (Ruth Franklin) 21. Hollywood (Vanda Krefft) J 11. Young adult biography (Catherine Reef) 22. Biography for magazines and websites VISIT OUR CONFERENCE BOOKSELLER 12. Popular culture (Brian Jay (Greg Daugherty) Jones and Kitty Kelley) 23. Promotional strategies Merritt Bookstore of Millbrook, New York, in partnership with BIO 2019, 13. Visual and performing (Jennifer Richards) will be selling recent biographies by our speakers, panelists, and other conference partici: arts (Patricia Albers) pants at the book table on Saturday, May 18. The table will be open from 10 a.m. to s:30 p.m.

~io-;.OGRA~ ONAl 0RGA~N~I-VJ- IO_N______...,. __ ~Îc!ÇOGRAP~ Al ORGAN--12/i_l_lO_ N______CRAFT and Marquette University. She's currently completing a bi­ Moderator Prijs, and a former BIO board member. He publishes wide­ Balancing an Artist's Life and Work ography of short-story writer and novelist Alice Adams that ly on theoq· and biography, including Theoretica/Approaches Nigel Hamilton is the award-winning, best-selling au­ 3:15-4:lSPM Scribner will publish in November 2019. She Jives in Sonoma to Biography (2014) and The Biographical Turn, Lives in History County, California. thor ofJFK : Reckless Youth, Monty, American Caesars, and War (2017). He also broadcasts regularly on radio. He ha,s writ­ How do biographers balance the story of a life with a and Peace: FDR's Final Odyssey: D-Day to Yalta, 1943-1945, the ten Jives of Jan Hanlo and Jan Campert, is co-author of The final volume of his "FDR at War" trilogy. He is senior fel­ description of the work, especially when those stories, INSPIRATION ABC ofModern Biography, and is now tackling the artist Theo The Study of Biography Today low in the McCormack Graduate School, University of van Doesburg. paintings, sonatas, or poems are the very reason for Massachusetts, where BIO held its inaugural annual confer­ 3:15- 4 :lSPM the biography? How do we craft narratives that dem­ ence and he became the organization's first elected presi­ INSPIRATION onstrate not only what an artist has created but how, No writer can fail to be curious about biography dent. He has taught biography at Royal Holloway, University Reckless Youth illuminating the mysteries of a process that often oc­ of London, and De Montfort University in Britain, as well as today: what exactly it is, what is its history, its role curs alone and unrecorded? What if the drama of the at UMass Boston. He has written widely on the history and 3:15-4:lSPM in society, how and why it has developed, where it is life eclipses the work? And how do we resolve these practice of biography. With Hans Renders he is co-author of going ... In this panel, three experienced teachers and Three biographers discuss their youthful (biograph­ classic narrative challenges while also highlight­ the recent ABC ofModern Biography. practitioners of biography will guide us through bi­ ical) passions. This panel takes its title from Nigel ing the sometimes invisible thread connecting life ography's expanding universe-one that goes back to Hamilton's classic biography of JFK and asks three and work? Panelists Plutarch and forward to Wikipedia, biodocs, art in­ biographers who dared to start in young what drew Carol DeBoer-Langworthy teaches biography in stallations, and nonfiction graphic novels. From ethics them to the genrè, how they acquired the skills and Moderator the Nonfiction Writing Program of Brown University's persistence to see their work through to publication, to facts, journalism to psychology, identity to theory, Department of English as well as creative nonfiction, his­ Karin Roffman is the author of The Songs We Know Best.john their purpose is to help us understand how a deeper torica! narrative, diaries, letters, personal journalism, and and what advantages and obstacles their youthfulness Ashbery's Early Lift (Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2017), which understanding of biography in all its facets will make autobiography. She has taught English in Egypt, been a presented. Young·writers have taken over the memoir was one of the New York Times 100 Notable Books in 2017. us become better biographers. Fulbright lecturer in Turkey, and is currently at work on field; we hope more will follow the examples of Lance She has also published From the Modernist Annex: Wamen a literary biography of the American writer Neith Boyce Richardson, Abigail Santamaria, and Holly Van Leuven Writers in Libraries and Museums (2010), the winner of the (1872-1951). Also a documentary editor, DeBoer-Langworthy and keep biography vibrant. Learn from their stories University of Alabama Manuscript Prize. She has published is past president of the Association for Documentary and support younger BIO members in their work. on art, poetry, and biography in Raritan, Modern Fiction Editing and now the editor of LiftwritingAnnual: Biographical Studies, Artfarum, Rain Taxi, and others. She currently writes andAutobiographical Studies. "The Unanswered Question" column for the Biographer's Moderator Graft newsletter and is senior lecturer and associate direc­ Billy Tooma is the award-nominated documentary filmmak­ Megan Marsha/1 is the author of three biographies: The tor of Public Humanities at Yale University. ~ -9Z13iOGRAPHER'S er behind Clarence Chambertin: Fly First & Fight Afterward and Peabody Sisters: Three Women Who Ignited American TheB!ackEagleofHarlem. He teaches English at Essex County Romanticism (2005), winner of the Francis Parkman Prize, Panelists ~uv AMONTHLYNEWSLE1TER ' College in Newark, New Jersey, where he incorporates biog­ the Mark Lynton History Prize, and a finalist for the ...... ' . . .. raphy studies into his undergraduate courses (such as pair­ Pulitzer Prize; : A New American Lift (2013), Patricia Albers is the author of joan Mitchel/, Lady Painter: ing the biographies of authors with their literary works, which was awarded the Pulitzer Prize in 2014; and Elizabeth A Lift, which was judged by a New York Times reviewer to be with an entire semester focused on biography and history). Bishop: A Miracle far Breakfast (2017), a finalist for the Phi Beta "a book about Mitchell that I cannot imagine will ever be Professor Tooma earned his doctorate at Drew University, Kappa Society's Christian Gauss Prize for literary scholar­ improved upon." Albers's previous biography was Shadows, ~ch month, members of BIO receive where he is now on the Arts & Letters graduate faculty; his ship. She is the Charles Wesley Emerson College Professor at Fire, Snow: The Lift ofTina Modotti. She is now completing the an informative newsletter devoted to Biographical Documentaries course ran in fall 2018. He be­ Emerson College, where she teaches in the M.F.A. Creative first biography of the Hungarian-born photographer André the art and craft of biography. lieves strongly in the study of biography in grade school as Writing Program. Kertész, to be published by Other Press. Albers often writes well as in higher education. for museum catalogs and reviews art books and exhibitions. She Jives in the Bay Area, where she teaches at San Francisco Panelists The Biographer's Craft features news Hans Renders directs the Biography Institute, Groningen State University. University, where he is professor of history and theory of Lance Richardson is the author of House of Nutter: Th e about the business, interviews and biography, which he teaches. He is editor-in-chief of the se­ Rebel Tailor ofSavile Row, about two brothers-one a design­ Mark Dery is a cultural critic best known for his essays articles with biographers about ries Biography Studies, board chair of Het Biografisch Portaal er, the other a photographer-who had an indelible impact on Afrofuturism (a term he coined) and culture jamming van Nederland, a board member of De Nederlandse Biografie in the worlds of twentieth century fashion and rock music. (a phenomenon he popularized). His byline has appeared techniques, notification of books sold in a broad range of publications, including the New York Times Magazine, Bookfarum, Rolling Stone, and Wired. Dery has to publishers, new biographies coming been a professor of journalism at NYU, taught aesthetics into stores, research tips, and more. in the Yale School of Art, was a Chancellor's Distinguished Fellow at UC Irvine and a visiting scholar at the American Academy in Rome. His most recent book is a biography, Born to Be Posthumous: The Eccentric Lift and Mysterious Genius of NEED HELP WITH YOUR BIOGRAPHY? EdwardGorey (Little, Brown, 2018). NPR,Menta!Floss, and the It's just one more benefit of Guardian named it one of the Best Books of 2018, and it was a Whether you are just starting to think of a subject, immersed in research, or work­ New York Tim es Editors' Choice. your BIO membership. ing on a manuscript, BIO's mentoring program can help. You choose the num­ Carol Sklenicka's Raymond Garver: A Writer's Lift was named ber of hours you need for mentoring by phone or email. The first hour is $60. one of the Best 10 Books of 2009 by the New York Times Book Subsequent hours are charged at a higher rate. To take advantage of this pro- Review and a notable book of that year by thé San Francisco gram, contact Cathy Curtis: [email protected]. Chronicle and the Washington Post. Sklenicka earned a Ph.D. at Washington University in St. Louis and taught literature and writing at the Milwaukee Institute of Art and _Design

U·~ U·~ V' 8IOGRAPHERS INTERNATIONAL ORGANIZATION V' 81001\APHERS INTERNATIONAL ORGANIZATION As a journalist, his work has appeared in , The of and the Warren College M.F.A. Panelists Public Scholar Program fellowship, and a W. .E. B. DuBois Atlantic, Slate, Al Jazeera, newyorker.com, and the nation­ Program for Writers. Research Institute fellowship at Harvard. Her biography of al newspaper of Australia, where he is originally from. He Stacy Schift is the author of Véra (Mrs. Vladimir Nabokov), Jessica Mitford is forthcoming from HarperCollins. is currently at work on his second book, True Nature: The Kavita Das writes about culture, race, feminism, and their winner of the Pulitzer Prize; Saint-Exupéry, a Pulitzer Prize Odyssey ofPeter Matthiessen, which wil! be released sometime intersections. Nominated for a 2016 Pushcart Prize, Das's finalist; and A Great Improvisation: Frank/in, France, and the Panelists before the next century. work is published or forthcoming in Tin House, Longreads, The Birth ofAmerica , winner of the George Washington Book Atlantic, Off Assignment, Los Angeles Review of Books, the Prize. A No. 1 best seller, her Cleopatra: A Lift, was published /mani Perry is the Hughes-Rogers Professor of Aftican Abigail Santamaria is currently at work on I Am Meg· The Washington Post, Kenyon Review, NBC News Asian America, to great acclaim in 2010. David McCullough hailed her most American Studies at Princeton University, where she is Lift ofMadeleine L'Engle (forthcoming from Farrar, Straus and Guernica, Quartz, McSweeney's, The Rumpus, and elsewhere. recent book, The Witches: Salem, 1692, also a No. 1 best seller, also affiliated with the Program in Gender and Sexuality Giroux), the first adult biography of the author who brought Her first book, Poignant Song· The Lift and Music ofLakshmi as "brilliant from start to finish." Schiff has received fellow­ Studies and the Program in Law and Public Affairs. A schol­ usA Wrinkle in Time. She is also the author of]oy: Poet, Seeker, Shankar (Harper Collins , June 2019), is a biography of ships from the Guggenheim Foundation and the National ar of legal history, cultural and literary studies, Perry is &- the Woman Who Captivated C. S. Lewis (Houghton Miffiin the Grammy-nominated Hindustani singer, who played a Endowment for the Humanities and was a Director's Fellow the author of five books, including the 2018 biography of Harcourt, 2015), about the communist poet Joy Davidman. pivotal role in bringing Indian music to the West. Das is also at the Cullman Center for Scholars and Writers. Lorraine Hansberry: Looking.for Lorraine. Perry lives in the In 2016, Santamaria co-founded Biography by Design, LLC, at work on a collection of personal essays. Philadelphia area with her two sons. with Kate Buford, to help individuals and corporations Gretchen Holbrook Gerzina's four biographies are write their stories. She earned an M.F.A. in nonfiction from Joseph A. Esposito is a writer, a historian, and an edu­ Carrington: A Lift, Frances Hodgson Burnett: The Unexpected Lift Joanna Scutts is a literary critic and cultural historian Columbia University, has contributed to numerous publica­ cator. He served in three presidential administrations, in­ of the Author ofThe Secret Garden, Black London: Lift Befare based in New York. She is the author of The Extra Woman: tions, and lives in New York City with her family. cluding being appointed a deputy undersecretary for in­ Emancipation, and Mr. and Mrs. Prince: How an Extraordinary How Marjorie Hillis Led a Generation of Wamen to Live Afone ternational affairs at the U.S. Department of Education. Eighteenth-Century Family Moved out ofSlavery and into Legend. and Like It (Liveright, 2017), and her writing has appeared Holly Van Leuven is the author of Ray Bolger: More than a He also worked at the U.S. Agency for International She has edited five other books and published numer­ in the Washington Post, newyorker.com, Slate, and the Scarecrow (Oxford University Press, 2019). She began the Development. He is currently an adjunct faculty member at ous articles and chapters. She has been a tenured profes­ Guardian, among many other venues. As a researcher and project at age 20-while pursuing her B.F.A. at Emerson Northern Virginia Community College. Esposito holds aca­ sor at Vassar, Barnard, Dartmouth, and the University of curator at the New-York Historica! Society, she helped plan College-when she coincidentally met one of Bolger's for­ demie degrees from Pennsylvania State University, George Massachusetts Amherst, and a named professor at the latter and launch the new _Center for Women's History, which mer dance partners through YouTube. Pursuing the trail Mason University, , the University two. She is the clean of Commonwealth Honors College at opened to the public in 2017. Her new book project explores of Bolger, Van Leuven became the first research er to access of Pennsylvania, and University of Virginia. His meeting the University of Massachusetts Amherst, and was elected friendship and feminism in New York in the 1910s. his private papers stored at UCLA. Van Leuven's early work John F. Kennedy when he was ten years old sparked a life­ in 2017 to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. She Elaine Showalter is professor emerita of English and earned her Emerson College's Senior Writing Award for time interest in polities and history, and, ultimately, the is currently completing a biracial family memoir. Avalon Professor of the Humanities at Princeton University. High Distinction in Nonfiction, the highest award granted writing of his book Dinner in Camelot: The Night America's She has written ten books, including A Jury of Her Peers: to undergraduates by the college. In 2014, she became the Greatest Scientists, Writers, and Scha/ars Partied at the Kennedy Michael Hainey is the author of the New York Times best­ inaugural winner ofBIO's Hazel Rowley Prize. White House. selling memoir After Visiting Friends: A Son's Story. The book American Wamen Writers /rom Anne Bradstreet to Annie Proulx is currently being adapted for the screen. He is an editor (Knopf, 2009), which was awarded the Capote Prize BASICS CRAFT and writer at Esquire magazine and has also worked for GQ for Literary Criticism. Her most recent book, The Civil Wars and Spy magazines. ofJulia Ward Howe: A Biography, was published in 2016. She First-Time Biographers Fact and Speculation reviews books for many newspapers and periodicals in the 4:30-5:30PM 4:30-5:30PM INSP/RATION U.S. and U.K. including many biographies. Showalter is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature An idea for a biographical subject is just the start of an Facts are often perceived as the bedrock of writing The Past, Present, and Future often long and complex journey. How does one begin the a biography, and speculation is viewed as a risky en­ of Feminist Biography process of research for a biography? How does one bring deavor. But how does the biographer deal with lapses 4:30-5:30PM a book to market? Come learn from four biographers who in the documentation, with inconsistencies and uncer­ were once, but are no longer, new to the form, as they de­ tainties, and with the downright unknowable? Three This panel will explore the impact of feminism in its scribe the obstacles they faced and overcame. many forms on the field of biography, from the sec­ biographers who have confronted an incomplete re­ cord in their research share their experiences and dis­ ond wave of the 1970s to today's #MeToo movement. SPREAD THE Moderator How have feminist critics and scholars challenged the cuss strategies for connecting the dots. As one biog­ scope and purpose of the white male-dominated field Brooklyn-born and currently L.A.-based, Lisa Napoli is rapher noted, "A biographer will inevitably be caught WORD! of biography? How does a focus on women's lives alter a career journalist who has worked in all media. Her first between the Scylla of speculation and the Charybdis To post news and photos from biography, Ray &- joan: The Man Who Made the McDonald's our understanding of what biography can and should of the limited archive." The discussion should help the this year's BIO conference, Fortune and the Wamen Who Gave It All Away, was her second accomplish? What kinds of women's lives warrant and biographer navigate this treacherous literary channel. book. It was published in November 2016 by Dutton. She's deserve biographical treatment? Are biographies of please use this special confer­ currently working with BIO board member Sonja Williams women inevitably feminist? And how will the field of ence hashtag: on a podcast featuring biographers, as wel! as on a history Moderator biography be affected by the gender polities of our of the creation of CNN. James McGrath Morris's books include the New York current moment? #BIONYC2019 best-selling Times Eye on the Struggle: Ethe! Payne, The First To post other information Panelists Lady of the Black Press, which was awarded the Benjamin Moderator about BIO, at any time of the Jonathan Blunk is the biographer of the revered and influ­ Hooks National Book Prize for the best work in civil rights ential American poet James Wright (1927-1980). His autho­ history; Pulitzer: A Lift in Polities, Print, and Power; and The Carla Kaplan, Davis Distinguished Professor of American year, please use rized biography,James Wright: A Lift in Poetry, was published Ambulance Drivers: Hemingway, Dos Passos, and a Friendship Literature at Northeastern University, has published seven by Farrar, Straus and Giroux in 2017. Blunk is also a poet, an Made and Lost in War. He is currently wÓrking on a biogra­ books on women's writing, including Zora Neale Hurston: #Biographerslnternational essayist, and a radio producer. His work has appeared in The phy of Tony Hillerman, author of a groundbreaking series A Lift in Letters, an epistolary biography of Zora Neale Nation, Poets &- Writers, The Georgia Review, FIELD, and else­ of Navajo detective novels. Hurston, and Miss Anne in Harlem, a group biography of the where. He assisted with editingA Wild Perfection, the select­ white women of the Harlem Renaissance, both New York ed letters of James Wright (FSG, 2005). Blunk is a graduate Times Notable Books. She has received numerous fellowships and awards, including a Guggenheim Fellowship, a Cullman Center Fellowship at the New York Public Library, an NEH

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INSPIRATION chosen as a New York Times Notable Book of the Year and was Biography and Science a finalist for the LosAngeles Times Book Prize. She is current­ ly writing a biography of Setsuko Nakamura Thurlow, who Sunday 4:30-5:30PM ~ survived the atomie bombing of Hiroshima at age thirteen 9:00AM-11:00AM Press, St. Martin's, Simon & Schuster, and Wiley, among Science is deeply embedded in modern civilization­ and has spent the rest of her life trying to prevent it from other houses. He is the author of two collections of poems, but the average citizen does not understand the sci­ happening again. For conference attendees who have registered in ad­ Theory ofDevolution and Clay. A graduate of the lowa Wrife rs vance for them, these optional, in-depth workshops will Workshop, he teaches poetry, nonfiction, and publishing in entific life or how scientific discoveries are made. David N. Schwartz holds a B.A. from Stanford University Neither is it generally understood that scientific dis­ be held Sunday morning on the Concourse Level of the the M.F.A. creative writing program of the City College of and a Ph.D. from the Massachusetts Institute ofTechnology. Graduate Center. New York. covery is never a neat story. Writing about a life in sci­ He has worked at the U.S. Department of State, the ence is thus by definition particularly onerous. The bi­ Brookings lnstitution, and Goldman Sachs in London and Writing a Biography Proposal Working with Photographs ographer in this case has to understand not only the New York. He has published widely on U.S. strategie nucle­ in Biography ar weapons policy, NATO, and foreign policy, and is the au­ JIM RUTMAN life, but also the science. What are the peculiar obsta­ LERONN P. BROOKS, PH.D. cles facing the biography of a scientist? thor of the recently published biography The Last Man Who · Determining the dimensions and setting the priori­ Knew Everything· The Lift and Times ofEnrico Fermi, Father of ties for your subject are key ingredients in an appeal­ How can photographs or illustrations change the re­ the Nuclear Age (Basic Books). He Jives in New York with his ception of your biography? In this workshop we will Moderator wife, Susan. ing and successful proposal. We will discuss and pin­ discuss that important question and explore the fol­ Kai Bird is the executive director of the Leon Levy Center point options and strategies for putting forward and for Biography at CUNY Graduate Center. He co-authored Lawrence Weschler, director emeritus at the New York illuminating the strategies for framing the life you in­ lowing: How do you weave photos and illustrations with Martin J. Sherwin the -winning Institute for the Humanities at NYU, is the author of coming tend to chronicle by discussing what elements to em­ into your work in ways that support your subject? And biography, American Prometheus: The Triumph & Tragedy ofJ on twenty books, including Mr. Wilson's Cabinet of Wonder; phasize and how much to reveal (or strategically con­ how can this material complement your writing and Robert Oppenheimer. His most recent book was The Good Spy: parallel biographies of science-besotted artists Robert ceal) in the course of introducing and articulating keep readers invested in your biography as it evolves Irwin and David Hockney; Waves Passing in the Night: Walter The Lift and Death ofRobertAmes (2014). He is currently writ­ your intentions. Whatever your subject's level of fame from page to page? What can visual images reveal? Murch in the Land ofthe Astrophysicists; and, coming this sum­ ing a biography of President . Also, how does one find and secure copyright permis­ mer, And How Are You, Dr. Sacks?, a biographical memoir of or infamy, or the anticipated scale of your audience, his longtime friendship with the late, great neurologist. we will examine options for making your case most sions for photographs? You may bring examples of Panelists persuasively in a fraught marketplace. your writing-copies will be returned if possible­ Charlotte Jacobs is a professor of medicine (emerita) and, of course, your questions. at Stanford University. Her first biography, Henry Kaplan Jim Rutman represents a variety of journalists, histori­ and the Story ofHodgkin's Disease (2010), was selected as one ans, and critics whose work examines an array of cultural LeRonn P. Brooks, Ph.D., is an assistant professor in the of the Best Five Books on doctors' Jives by the Wal! Street and historica! subjects and figures that probe and challenge Department of Africana Studies at Lehman College of Joumal. Her second biography, jonas Salk: A Lift (2015), was standing assumptions about the world's inner workings. He CUNY. He is a specialist in modern and contemporary has worked with biographers who have chronicled the Jives American painting and sculpture. His interviews, essays, of Upton Sinclair, Martin Luther, Clarice Lispector, Jimi and poetry have appeared in Bomb Magazine, the International Hendrix, and Fernando Pessoa, along with biographies ReviewofAfricanAmericanArt, and publications for the Studio of concepts such as privacy, color, and doubt. He also rep­ Museum in Harlem, the Museum of Modern Art, Socrates resents formally adventurous and stylistically diverse fic­ Sculpture Park, the Spelman Museum of Art, as well as the tion writers like Sheila Heti, Alissa Nutting, Jesse Bali, and Aperture Foundation, among others. Brooks is currently Affinity Konar. He has been with Sterling Lord Literistic working on a themed biography of the Harlem Renaissance­ since 1998. era painter and educator Hale Aspacio Woodruff. Revising Your Manuscript Author Websites 101 DAVID GROFF MEREDITH HINDLEY & ANNE BOYD RIOUX Once you've gotten the basics of your biography on This workshop, conducted by two authors who have the page, how can you reshape, rewrite, and refine built their own websites, will provide instruction and The Graduate Center, CUNY, in partnership with the Leon Levy Center for your work so as to give it its best possible form, nar­ options for those also interested in building or up­ rative are, sense of character, thematic coherence, grading their websites. Some of the topics covered Biography, now offers a unique Master's Degree in Biography and Memoir. beauty, and impact? This workshop explores the dif­ will be: what an author site should include, how to ferent strategies involved in taking an early draft of a build a site, accessible platforms (such as Squarespace, • Study the craft and research methods of biographical writing, taught by biography and assessing its language, structure, story, Wordpress.com, and Wordpress.org), some design ba­ Pulitzer Prize-winning authors and distinguished professors of English and history. theme, balance, and focus so as to create an effective, sics (including tools like Canva), how to find a host for well-paced, professional, and moving manuscript. your site, useful plug-ins, and more. Participants will Working from the premise that revision is a creative leave with tools they can use to build their own sites. • Join a community of working biographers and engage with renowned LIJ act, we'll discuss the steps required in readying your authors at the public programs of the Leon Levy Center for Biography. book for agents, publishers, and readers. Meredith Hindley is the author of Destination Casablanca: !i:::, cc Exile, Espionage, and the Battle for North Africa in World War • Scholarships are available. c~ David Groff is an independent editor and publishing con­ II (PublicAffairs, 2017). She has spent more than two de­ IJ.I

\Ll.·~ ~i~ LORGAN_ I_ZM_ IO_N______V' BIOGRAPHERS lNTERNATIONAJ. ORGANIZATION Anne Boyd Rioux is the author of Meg, Jo, Beth, Amy: The Story ofLittle Wamen and Why It Still Matters (W. W. Norton, 2018) and Constance Fenimore Woolson: Portrait of a Lady Novelist (Norton), chosen as one of the ten best books ANN'UAL MEETING of 2016 by the Chicago Tribune. She is the recipient of two CONGRATULATIONS. TO NEH fellowships, one for public humanities, and is a pro­ BIO's Annual Meeting will take place during fessor at the University of New Orleans. Her website is the Board meeting, at 9:00 a.m. on Sunday, May http://anneboydrioux.com . . 19, at CUNY. Active members are invited to at­ JAMES MCGRATH MORRIS, tend the public portion of this meeting. RECIPIENT OF THE 2019 BIO AWARD

The 2019 Coaching Program

BIO would like to thank the following biographers for and, forthcoming, "Queen of the Muckrakers''.· The Lift and their participation in our fifth annual coaching pro­ Times ofJessica Mitford. Kaplan has received fellowships gram. These accomplished biographers are providing half­ from the NEH Public Scholar Program, Cullman Center, hour, one-on-one coaching sessions to those who have DuBois Institute, Ransom and Beinecke libraries, and the paid and arranged for such sessions in advance. In addi­ Guggenheim Foundation. She is currently editing a special tion, BIO now provides a year-round mentoring service via Signs issue, "Rage." email or phone. For more information, see the advertise­ ment elsewhere in this program or email Cathy Curtis at Carl Rollyson's biographies include American !sis: The Lift [email protected]. and Art of Sylvia Plath; A Real American Character: The Lift of Walter Brennan; Hollywood Enigma: Dana Andrews; Marilyn The Coaches Monroe: A Lift ofthe Actress; and Anry Lowel!Anew: A Biography. His books about biography include Biography: A User's Cathy Curtis is the author of three biographies of art­ Guide and Confessions of a Serial Biographer. His reviews of ists: Restless Ambition: Grace Hartigan, Painter (Oxford biographies have appeared in the Wal! Street Journal San University Press, 2015); A Generous Vision: The Creative Lift Francisco Chronicle, Minneapolis Star Tribune, The New of Elaine de Kooning (OUP, 2017); and Alive Still: The Singular Criterion, and other publications. Rollyson's two-volume bi­ Journey of Nel! Blaine (OUP, July 2019), about a leading New ography, The Lift of William Faulkner, will be published in York painter who became a paraplegie after contract­ the spring and fall of 2020. ing a severe form of polio at age thirty-seven but battled ~ the odds to become one of America's great watercolor­ Carol Sklenicka's Raymond Garver: A Writer's Lift was ists. Curtis is turning to the literary world for her next named one of the Best 10 Books of 2009 by the New York book, the first biography of novelist and critic Elizabeth Times Book Review and a notable book of that year by the San Hardwick, who was married to the poet . Francisco Chronicle, Seattle Times, Oregonian, and Washington Post. The book was a finalist for the PEN USA award and the Carla Kaplan, Davis Distinguished Professor of American Northern California Book Award. Before becoming a biog­ Literature at Northeastern University and chair of the rapher, Sklenicka earned a Ph .D. at Washington University Signs editorial board, has published seven books on in St. Louis and taught writing at the Milwaukee Institute African-American and women's literature and culture. Her , of Art and Design and Marquette University. Her current .... trade books include the award-winning Zora Neale Hurston: project, a biography of short-story writer and novelist A Lift in Letters and Miss Anne in Harlem: The White Wamen of Alice Adams, will be published by Scribner. the Black Renaissance (both New York Times Notable Books), Ethcl Payue, the fint Lady of the: Black Prchl> Ji\MF.S McGRATH MORRIS Rll'tJM:111 f

A SPECIAL THANK-YOU The Biographers International Organization would like to express its heartfelt grat­ itude to the Leon Levy Center for Biography for hosting our conference agajn this year. We especially wish to thank Kai Bird, executive director of the center, and Thad Ziolkowski, associate director, for their helpful advice at all stages of our joint planning.

ÎJi BIOGRAPHERS INTERNATIONAL ÜRGANIZATION

'f,i(ÇRA~ ORGAN~-,-7./J-IO_N______,.

Schedule-Saturday, May 18, 2019 All panels will take place on the Concourse level of the Graduate Center.

Registration and Breakfast 7:00-8:00AM CON COURSE

Welcome From Cathy Curtis and Kai Bird

8:15-9:15AM Plenary Session: David Remnick, Stacy Sch iff, and Judith Thurman in conversation PROSHANSKY AUDITORIUM

The Art, Craft , Telling Life and Market for 9:30-10:30AM Adventures in Stories in These Hidden Figures D Young Readers' the Archives D Chaotic Times D Biographies r:I

Fire Up Your Funding Primary and Biography in Search International 10:45-11 :45AM Narrative IJ Archival Research r:I of lts Subject D Identities D

Lunch, Round-Table Discussions, and Coaching 12:00-1:30PM CONCOURSE Coaching wil! take place in the break-out rooms adjacent to the Concourse.

' Presentation of the Hazel Rowley and Plutarch Awards 1 :45-3:00PM Keynote Address by James McGrath Morris, winner of the 2019 BIO Award PROSHANSKY AUDITORIUM

Promoting Your Balancing an Artist's The Study of 3:15-4:15PM Reckless Youth D Biography [l Life and Work r:I Biography Today D

The Past, Present, and First-Time Fact and Biography and 4:30-5:30PM Future of Feminist Biographers IJ Speculation a Science D Biography U

Closing Reception 5:30-7:00PM CON COURSE

IJ Basics r,;'I Craft U Inspiration

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