Arthur Phillips

Arthur Peter Monroe Phillips was born in Minneapolis, Minnesota. He is Jewish. He received a BA in history from Harvard University in 1990. After spending two years in Budapest (1990–1992),{{cite web|url=http://www.identitytheory.com/people/birnbaum55.html|title=Arthur Phillips|work=Identity Theory|date=July 28, 2002|access-date=March 24, 2012|author=Birnbaum, Robert}} he then studied jazz saxophone for four semesters at Berklee College of Music (1992–93).{{cite web|url=http://www.berklee.edu/bt/192/other_paths.html|title=Other Paths|publisher=Berklee College of Music|access-date=March 24, 2012|author=Small, Mark}}

In several interviews, Phillips has stated he has been a child actor,[https://www.imdb.com/name/nm3373946 IMDb profile]; accessed April 4, 2014. a jazz musician,{{cite web|url=http://www.bookslut.com/features/2009_05_014440.php|title=An Interview with Arthur Phillips|work=Bookslut}} a speechwriter, an advertising copywriter for medical devices, and a "dismally failed entrepreneur."{{cite web|url=http://www.powells.com/blog/interviews/who-is-arthur-phillips-by-dave|title=Who is Arthur Phillips?|publisher=Powells.com|work=PowellsBooks.Blog|date=October 10, 2006|access-date=March 24, 2012|author=Weich, Dave}}

Phillips lived in Budapest from 1990 to 1992 and in Paris from 2001 to 2003, and now lives in New York. He was featured on the July 27, 2007, episode of This American Life, reading his short story "Wenceslas Square." The story is being produced for film by Amazon Studios, with a script by Phillips, to be directed by Sophia Takal.

Phillips was a five-time champion on Jeopardy! in 1997.{{cite news|url=http://www.thecrimson.com/article/1997/12/16/no-question-students-win-big-on|title=No Question: Students Win Big on 'Jeopardy!'|work=The Harvard Crimson|date=December 16, 1997|access-date=March 24, 2012|author=Chung, Theresa J.|location=Cambridge, MA}} In 2005, he competed in the Jeopardy! Ultimate Tournament of Champions. He won his opening-round game but lost in the second round.

Phillips is married to film producer Barbara Muschietti.

Prague, despite its title, is set almost entirely in Budapest, Hungary, primarily in 1990, with an interlude detailing several previous generations of Hungarian history, from the Austro-Hungarian monarchy through the First and Second World Wars.{{cite news |url=https://www.theguardian.com/books/2006/mar/25/featuresreviews.guardianreview15 |title=Putting the Pest in Buda|work=The Guardian|author=Lasdun, James|location=London|date=March 28, 2006}}

The main line of the novel follows a group of young Western expatriates through their lives in Budapest. The structure of the novel allows for various tales to be interwoven, producing an ensemble portrait of them and their adopted city, just recovering from decades of Communism, fascism, and war. The novel's recurring themes include nostalgia, sincerity and authenticity, and young people's first search for meaning in life. The novel was well received commercially and critically, winning Phillips a 2003 Los Angeles Times/Art Seidenbaum Award for Best First Fiction,{{Cite news|date=March 10, 2003|title=Los Angeles Times Book Prize Finalists Announced|work=Los Angeles Times|url=https://www.latimes.com/la-mediacenter-2003-01-story.html|access-date=June 1, 2021}} as well as other honors. {{citation needed|date=April 2014}}

The Egyptologist is structured as journals, letters, telegrams, and drawings, from several different points of view. The main story is set in 1922 and follows a hopeful explorer who, working near Howard Carter (the man who discovered the tomb of King Tutankhamun), risks more and more of his life and savings on an apparently quixotic effort to find the tomb of an apocryphal Egyptian king.{{ cite web |url=http://www.archaeology.org/online/reviews/egyptologist.html |title=The Egyptologist Who Would Be Pharaoh |work=Archeology.org |publisher=the Archaeological Institute of America |author=Pinkowski, Jennifer }}

The book was an international bestseller and critical success in more than two dozen countries. US critics noted Phillips's versatility in producing a book so different from his first, and fans of the book included Gary Shteyngart, George Saunders, Elizabeth Peters, and Stephen King. Others, however, most notably Michiko Kakutani of The New York Times, found the book overlong and confusing.{{cite news|url=https://www.nytimes.com/2004/08/24/books/books-of-the-times-archaeology-with-brio-if-no-mummy.html?scp=10&sq=%22arthur+phillips%22&st=nyt|work=The New York Times|title=Archaeology With Brio, If No Mummy|author=Kakutani, Michiko|date=August 24, 2004}}

Angelica is superficially a Victorian ghost story,{{cite news|url=https://www.nytimes.com/2007/05/13/books/review/Greer-t.html|title=Antique Horror Show|work=The New York Times|author=Greer, Andrew Sean|date=May 13, 2007}} and won Phillips comparisons to Henry James, Vladimir Nabokov, and Stephen King. The Washington Post'' opined that the novel cemented Phillips' reputation as "one of the best writers in America".{{cite news|url=https://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/03/29/AR2007032902525.html|title=The Haunting|newspaper=The Washington Post }}

In the novel, the same events are retold four times from four different perspectives, each section casting doubt on the version that came before, until the reader is left to sort truth from fantasy on his or her own.{{cite web|url=http://www.thedivareview.com/Happy_Tears_MLichtenstein_Interview.htm|title=Happy Tears|work=The Diva Review }} The novel has been made into a film by Mitchell Lichtenstein with a release date in late 2017.{{cite web|url=http://www.dreadcentral.com/news/87812/efm-2015-first-look-angelica/|title=Mitchell Lichtenstein: Angelica|work=The Diva Review |date=30 January 2015 }}

Phillips' fourth novel tells the story of a middle-aged man's pursuit of a young woman, an Irish pop singer performing in a bar.{{cite news|url=https://www.nytimes.com/2009/04/07/books/07kaku.html?_r=1&scp=1&sq=%22arthur+phillips%22&st=nyt|title=When Admiration Turns Into Obsession|work=The New York Times|author=Kakutani, Michiko|date=April 7, 2009}} According to a review at Bookpage

"Set in New York, the story follows Julian Donahue as he navigates the shadowy, grief-filled world of a parent who has lost a child [...] He's consumed by [the singer], but rather than introducing himself as another disposable fan, he becomes a faraway mentor and muse, setting himself on a course that will lead him from New York to Europe."

The novel was published on April 7, 2009. Preliminary reviews included a blurb from Kurt Andersen and this notice from Kirkus Reviews: "Phillips still looks like the best American novelist to have emerged during the present decade."{{cite web|url=http://www.kirkusreviews.com/book-reviews/fiction/arthur-phillips/the-song-is-you-2|title=The Song is You |work=Kirkus Review }}

{{reflist}}

• [http://www.arthurphillips.info Official website]
• [https://web.archive.org/web/20110713030102/http://indigestmag.com/blog/?p=5297 Arthur Phillips discusses The Tragedy of Arthur], indigestmag.com; accessed April 4, 2014
• [http://radiohappyhour.com/blog/episode-7-w-cursive-arthur-phillips-and-john-molly-knefel-is-up-now Arthur Phillips], Radio Happy Hour w/ Cursive (2010); accessed April 4, 2014
• [http://radiohappyhour.com/blog/ep-17-w-elizabeth-the-catapult-dave-hill-and-arthur-phillips Arthur Phillips on Radio Happy Hour (2011)], radiohappyhour.com; accessed April 4, 2014.
• [https://web.archive.org/web/20110721165139/http://indigestmag.com/blog/?p=8187 An interview with Arthur Phillips and John Reed on writing about Shakespeare], indigestmag.com; accessed April 4, 2014

{{Jeopardy!|state=collapsed}}

{{Authority control}}

{{DEFAULTSORT:Phillips, Arthur}}

Category:1969 births

Category:Living people

Category:Berklee College of Music alumni

Category:21st-century American novelists

Category:American male novelists

Category:Jewish American novelists

Category:Contestants on American game shows

Category:Harvard University alumni

Category:Writers from Minneapolis

Category:American expatriates in Hungary

Category:21st-century American male writers

Category:Novelists from Minnesota

Category:21st-century American Jews