Julie Schumacher

Schumacher received her bachelor's degree in Spanish and Creative Writing from Oberlin College in 1981. She earned her Master of Fine Arts degree in Fiction from Cornell University in 1986.{{cite web|url=https://julieschumacher.com/about/bio/|title=Bio|date=11 February 2017}}

Following her MFA, Schumacher held brief appointments as an instructor at Saint Olaf College and other academic institutions before joining the faculty at the University of Minnesota as an associate professor in 1996. She was promoted to Professor in 2008, and became Regents Professor in 2021. She has won multiple teaching awards and served as Director of the MFA Creative Writing Program at the University of Minnesota for twelve years.

Schumacher is married to Lawrence R. Jacobs, the Walter F. and Joan Mondale Chair for Political Studies and the Director of the Center for the Study of Politics at the University of Minnesota.{{cite web|url=https://www.minnesotaalumni.org/stories/i-married-a-pundit|title=I Married a Pundit|date=30 October 2018}}

Schumacher has authored multiple novels, stories, and essays. Her first novel, The Body Is Water, was an ALA Notable Book of the Year and a finalist for the PEN/Hemingway Award. Her other books include An Explanation for Chaos and five books for young readers: The Unbearable Book Club for Unsinkable Girls,{{cite web|url=https://www.kirkusreviews.com/book-reviews/julie-schumacher/unbearable-book-club-unsinkable-girls/|title=The Unbearable Book Club for Unsinkable Girls}} The Chain Letter, Black Box,{{cite web|url=https://www.kirkusreviews.com/book-reviews/julie-schumacher/black-box/|title=Black Box}} The Book of One Hundred Truths, and Grass Angel.

Schumacher is also the author of the national best-seller, Dear Committee Members, for which she was awarded the Thurber Prize for American Humor. She was the first woman to win the Thurber Prize.

In 2014, Kirkus Reviews called Dear Committee Members a “funny epistolary novel composed of recommendation letters written by a caustic, frustrated and cautiously hopeful English professor named Jason Fitger."{{cite web|url=https://www.kirkusreviews.com/book-reviews/julie-schumacher/dear-committee-members/|title=Dear Committee Members}} An NPR review noted that the novel "deftly mixes comedy with social criticism and righteous outrage. By the end, you may well find yourself laughing so hard it hurts."{{cite web|url=https://www.cincinnatireview.com/why-we-like-it/dear-committee-members-reviewed/|title=Dear Committee Members reviewed|date=4 September 2015}}

In 2018, Schumacher published The Shakespeare Requirement, a literary "satire that oscillates between genuine compassion and scathing mockery with admirable dexterity" (Kirkus).{{cite web|url=https://www.kirkusreviews.com/book-reviews/julie-schumacher/the-shakespeare-requirement/#:~:text=colleagues%20is%20popcornworthy.-,A%20witty%20but%20kindhearted%20academic%20satire%20that%20oscillates%20between%20genuine,scathing%20mockery%20with%20admirable%20dexterity.&text=Doerr%20captures%20the%20sights%20and,goodness%20of%20his%20major%20characters.|title= The Shakespeare Requirement}} The New Yorker described the novel as a "sad-professor satire that burns with moral anger."{{cite magazine|url=https://www.newyorker.com/books/page-turner/the-shakespeare-requirement-is-a-sad-professor-satire-that-burns-with-moral-anger|title="The Shakespeare Requirement" Is a Sad-Professor Satire That Burns with Moral Anger|magazine=The New Yorker |date=9 August 2018 |last1=Waldman |first1=Katy }}

• 1995 - PEN/Hemingway finalist and ALA Notable book of the Year, The Body Is Water
• 2000 - Loft Award in Creative Prose, The Loft Literary Center
• 2007 - Minnesota Book Award
• 2008 - Distinguished Educator Award, The College of Continuing Education
• 2010 - Horace T. Morse-Minnesota Alumni Association Award for Outstanding Contributions to Undergraduate Education
• 2011 – Rockefeller Foundation Bellagio Fellowship
• 2015 - Winner, Thurber Prize for American Humor{{cite web|url=https://www.goodreads.com/award/show/32007-thurber-prize|title=Thurber Prize Winners}}
• 2016 - 2019 - Scholar of the College, University of Minnesota
• 2019 - Award for Outstanding Contributions to Graduate and Professional Education, University of Minnesota{{cite web|url=https://scholarswalk.umn.edu/faculty-awards/awards-for-outstanding-contributions/grad-and-professional|title=Award for Outstanding Contributions to Graduate and Professional Education}}
• 2021 - Regents Professorship, University of Minnesota{{cite web|url=https://uawards.umn.edu/regents-professorship/current-regents-professors|title=Current Regents Professors}}

• The Body is Water (1995) ISBN 9781569470428
• An Explanation for Chaos (1998) ISBN 9780380730506
• Grass Angel (2004) ISBN 9780385730730
• The Chain Letter (2005) ISBN 9780385731690
• The Book of One Hundred Truths (2006) ISBN 9780385732901
• Black Box (2008) ISBN 9780385735421
• The Unbearable Book Club for Unsinkable Girls (2012) ISBN 9780385737739
• Dear Committee Members (2014) ISBN 9780345807335
• Doodling for Academics: A Coloring and Activity Book (2017) ISBN 9780226467047
• The Shakespeare Requirement (2018) ISBN 978-0385542340
• The English Experience (2023) ISBN 978-0385550123

• “Was This Student Dangerous?” The New York Times, June 18, 2014
• “What My Mother Wanted Us to Pack,” The New York Times, Sunday, November 8, 2015
• “I Married a Pundit.” Minnesota Alumni Magazine, Fall 2018.

Schumacher is married to Lawrence R. Jacobs, a political scientist and founder and director of the Center for the Study of Politics and Governance (CSPG) at the University of Minnesota. He was appointed the Walter F. and Joan Mondale Chair for Political Studies at the University of Minnesota’s Humphrey School of Public Affairs in 2005 and holds the McKnight Presidential Chair.{{cite news |url=https://www.twincities.com/2018/03/03/business-people-sunday-march-4/ |title=Business People: Sunday, March 4 |work=St. Paul Pioneer Press |location=St. Paul, Minnesota |date=2018-03-03 |accessdate=2020-01-23 }}{{cite web |url= https://cla.umn.edu/about/directory/profile/ljacobs |title=Faculty & Staff: Larry Jacobs (Curriculum Vitae) |author= |website=University of Minnesota: College of LiberalArts |access-date=2020-01-24}} They met in an English class during their first year at Oberlin College.{{cite magazine |last=Schumacher |first=Julie A. |date=Fall 2018 |title=I Married a Pundit |url=https://www.minnesotaalumni.org/stories/i-married-a-pundit |magazine=Minnesota Alumni |access-date=2020-01-24 }}

They have two adult daughters, Emma Lillian Jacobs and Isabella Nan Jacobs Hale.{{cite book|last=Jacobs|first=Lawrence R.|author-link=Lawrence R. Jacobs|title=The Health of Nations: Public Opinion and the Making of American and British Health Policy|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=mJUahsui4VcC&pg=PR14|year=1993|publisher=Cornell University Press|isbn=0-8014-2761-4}}

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Category:Living people

Category:American women novelists

Category:Oberlin College alumni

Category:Cornell University alumni

Category:University of Minnesota faculty

Category:Writers from Wilmington, Delaware

Category:Year of birth missing (living people)

Category:21st-century American women