Laird Hunt

Laird Hunt was born on April 3, 1968, in Singapore. His father was an American banker who moved along with his family in various places such as Amsterdam, London, and elsewhere. After his parents divorced, Hunt was sent to live with his grandmother in Indiana, where he went to the Clinton Central High School.{{cite journal |last=Ruland |first=Jim |date=January 2010 |title=An Interview with Laird Hunt (part 1) |journal=Hobart Another Literary Journal |url=http://www.hobartpulp.com/website/january/hunt.html |access-date=April 15, 2023 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120414224047/http://www.hobartpulp.com/website/january/hunt.html |archive-date=April 14, 2012 |url-status=dead}}

He earned a Bachelor of Arts from Indiana University Bloomington in 1989 and a Master of Fine Arts in Creative Writing from the Jack Kerouac School of Disembodied Poetics at Naropa University in 1996. He studied French literature at the Sorbonne in 1996.

He was for a time a professor in the Creative Writing program at University of Denver. He currently teaches in Brown University’s [https://literaryarts.brown.edu/people/laird-hunt Literary Arts Program].

Hunt is the author of eight novels and a collection of short work, including the 2021 National Book Award finalist [https://www.nationalbook.org/books/zorrie/ Zorrie]. He has translated several novels from the French, including Oliver Rohe's Vacant Lot (2010) and Stuart Merrill's Paul Verlaine (2010).

His works is said to intersect several genres, including experimental literature, exploratory fiction, literary noir, speculative fiction and difficult fiction{{cite journal |last=Kamine |first=Mark |year=2005 |title=In Defense of Difficulty |journal=The Believer |url=http://www.believermag.com/issues/200511/?read=article_kamine |access-date=April 15, 2023}}{{cite journal |last=Ruland |first=Jim |date=February 2010 |title=An Interview with Laird Hunt (part 2) |journal=Hobart Another Literary Journal |url=http://www.hobartpulp.com/website/february/hunt2.html |access-date=April 15, 2023}} and include elements ranging from the bizarre, the tragic, and the comic.

His influences include Georges Perec, W. G. Sebald, Samuel Beckett, Franz Kafka and the French Modernists.{{cite journal |last=Tiffany |first=Matthew |date=September 2009 |title=Ray of The Star by Laird Hunt |journal=The Quarterly Conversation |url=http://quarterlyconversation.com/ray-of-the-star-by-laird-hunt |access-date=April 15, 2023}}{{cite journal |last=Kamine |first=Mark |date=November 2005 |title=In Defense of Difficulty |journal=The Believer |url=http://www.believermag.com/issues/200511/?read=article_kamine |access-date=April 15, 2023}}

While working on his first novel, Hunt worked in the press office at the United Nations.

Hunt's reviews and essays have been published in The New York Times, the Washington Post, the Wall Street Journal, the Daily Beast, The Guardian, the Irish Times, and the Los Angeles Times. His fiction and translations have appeared in literary journals such as Conjunctions, McSweeney's, Bomb, Ploughshares, Bookforum, The Believer, Fence, and Zoetrope. For a time, Hunt was editor in the Denver Quarterly.

In 2014, it was announced by Element Pictures that Irish director Lenny Abrahamson would film an adaptation of Hunt's Civil War novel Neverhome,{{cite news| title= Irish Film: Lenny Abrahamson to adapt Laird Hunt's Neverhome |first=Niall|last= Murphy |url=http://www.scannain.com/irish/neverhome-announcement |publisher = Scannain |date = September 24, 2014|access-date=April 15, 2023}}{{cite news|first=Ben|last= Kirby| title=Lenny Abrahamson Heads For Neverhome |url=https://www.empireonline.com/movies/news/lenny-abrahamson-heads-neverhome/ |work=Empire|date = September 25, 2014|access-date=April 15, 2023}} but the project did not materialize.

Hunt lives in Providence, Rhode Island with his wife Eleni Sikelianos, a poet and the grand-grand-daughter of Greek poet Angelos Sikelianos, and their daughter Eva.

• 2013 Anisfield-Wolf Book Awards for fiction for Kind One{{cite news |first=Joanna |last=Conners |title=Writer Wole Soyinka intends to be in Cleveland for Anisfield-Wolf award later this year |url=http://www.cleveland.com/books/index.ssf/2013/04/writer_wole_soyinka_intends_to.html |newspaper=The Plain Dealer |date=2013-04-24 |access-date=April 15, 2023}}
• 2013 PEN/Faulkner Award for Fiction finalist for Kind One{{cite news |first=Carolyn |last=Kellogg |title=2013 PEN/Faulkner Award finalists announced |url=http://www.latimes.com/features/books/jacketcopy/la-et-jc-2013-pen-faulkner-award-finalists-announced-20130306,0,7850562.story |newspaper=The Los Angeles Times |date=2013-03-06 |access-date=April 15, 2023}}
• 2015 Grand Prix de Littérature Américaine for Neverhome{{cite web |url=http://www.livreshebdo.fr/article/laird-hunt-premier-laureat-du-grand-prix-de-litterature-americaine |title=Laird Hunt, premier lauréat du Grand prix de littérature américaine |language=fr |work=Livres Hebdo |author=Anne-Laure Walter |date=November 8, 2017 |access-date=April 15, 2023}}
• 2021 National Book Award for Fiction finalist for Zorrie{{Cite web|last=|date=2021-10-06|title=National Book Awards 2021 shortlists announced|url=https://www.booksandpublishing.com.au/articles/2021/10/06/194761/national-book-award-2021-shortlists-announced/|access-date=April 15, 2023|website=Books+Publishing|language=en-AU}}
• 2024 Guggenheim Fellowship.{{Cite web|url=https://www.gf.org/announcements/|title=Announcements – John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation…|date=15 May 2024|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20240515223904/https://www.gf.org/announcements/ |archive-date=15 May 2024}}

• {{cite book | first=Laird | last=Hunt | author-mask=2 | title=Dear Home | year=1999 | publisher=Small Press Distribution | isbn=9781893032200 }}
• {{cite book | first=Laird | last=Hunt | author-mask=2 | title=The Paris Stories | orig-year=2000 | year=2010 | publisher=Smokeproof Press; Marick Press | isbn=9780965887786 }}
• {{cite book | first=Laird | last=Hunt | author-mask=2 | title=The Impossibly | orig-year=2001 | year=2012 | publisher=Coffee House Press | location=Minneapolis | isbn=9781566891172 }}
• {{cite book | first=Laird | last=Hunt | author-mask=2 | title=Indiana, Indiana | year=2003 | publisher=Coffee House Press | location=Minneapolis | isbn=9781566891448 | url=https://coffeehousepress.org/products/indiana-indiana }}
• {{cite book | first=Laird | last=Hunt | author-mask=2 | title=The Exquisite | year=2006 | publisher=Coffee House Press | location=Minneapolis | isbn=9781566891875 | url=https://coffeehousepress.org/products/the-exquisite | url-access=registration }}
• {{cite book | first=Laird | last=Hunt | author-mask=2 | title=Ray of the Star | year=2009 | publisher=Coffee House Press | location=Minneapolis | isbn=9781566892322 }}
• {{cite book | first=Laird | last=Hunt | author-mask=2 | title=Kind One | year=2012 | publisher=Coffee House Press | location=Minneapolis | isbn=9781566893114 | url=https://coffeehousepress.org/products/kind-one | url-access=registration }}
• {{cite book | first=Laird | last=Hunt | author-mask=2 | title=Neverhome | year=2014 | publisher=Little, Brown and Company | location=New York | isbn=9780316370134 | url=https://www.littlebrown.com/titles/laird-hunt/neverhome/9780316370165/# | url-access=registration }}
• {{cite book | first=Laird | last=Hunt | author-mask=2 | title=The &NOW Awards 2: The Best Innovative Writing | year=2013 | publisher=&NOW Books, Lake Forest College Press | isbn=9780982315644 }}
• {{cite book | first=Laird | last=Hunt | author-mask=2 | title=The Evening Road | year=2017 | publisher=Little, Brown and Company | isbn=9780316391283 | url=https://www.littlebrown.com/titles/laird-hunt/the-evening-road/9780316391313/ }}
• {{cite book | first=Laird | last=Hunt | author-mask=2 | title=In the House in the Dark of the Woods | year=2018 | publisher=Little, Brown and Company | isbn=9780316411059 | url=https://www.littlebrown.com/titles/laird-hunt/in-the-house-in-the-dark-of-the-woods/9780316515801/ }}
• {{cite book | first=Laird | last=Hunt | author-mask=2 | title=Zorrie | year=2021 | publisher=Bloomsbury Publishing | isbn=9781635575361 | url=https://www.bloomsbury.com/us/zorrie-9781635575361/ }}
• {{cite book | first=Laird | last=Hunt | author-mask=2 | title=This Wide Terraqueous World | year=2023 | publisher=Coffee House Press | isbn=9781566896672 | url=https://coffeehousepress.org/products/this-wide-terraqueous-world }}

{{reflist}}

• [https://www.lairdhunt.org Laird Hunt's office website]
• [https://coffeehousepress.org/search?q=laird+hunt Laird Hunt at Coffee House Press]
• [https://www.bloomsbury.com/us/author/laird-hunt/ Laird Hunt at Bloomsbury]
• [https://www.littlebrown.com/contributor/laird-hunt/ Laird Hunt at Little, Brown]

• [https://www.npr.org/2021/11/13/1055503620/laird-hunt-proves-life-lays-in-the-seemingly-mundane-through-the-life-of-zorrie Weekend Edition], November 13, 2021
• [https://journals.openedition.org/transatlantica/17745?lang=en Transatlantica], December 2021
• [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8ERMdCNorLk Harvard Bookstore], February 2021
• [https://themillions.com/2017/03/tk-laird-hunt.html The Millions], March 17, 2017
• [https://issuu.com/jarmenteros/docs/hunt_interview Issuu], February 11, 2016
• [https://www.bookforum.com/interviews/bookforum-talks-to-laird-hunt-10874 Bookforum], January 18, 2013
• [https://www.hobartpulp.com/web_features/an-interview-with-laird-hunt-part-1 Hobart (Part One)], January 1, 2010
• [https://www.hobartpulp.com/web_features/an-interview-with-laird-hunt-part-2 Hobart (Part Two)], February 1, 2010

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Category:Living people

Category:1968 births

Category:21st-century American male writers

Category:21st-century American novelists

Category:Writers from Boulder, Colorado

Category:Indiana University Bloomington alumni

Category:American male novelists

Category:PEN/Faulkner Award for Fiction winners

Category:Brown University faculty