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Daniel Torday

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Daniel Torday
OccupationNovelist, professor
Alma materKenyon College
Syracuse University
Notable works"The Last Fight of Poxl West"

Daniel Torday is an American novelist, short story writer and essayist.[1] He serves as an Associate Professor and Director of Creative Writing at Bryn Mawr College.[2]

Career

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Torday graduated from Kenyon College in 2000 and continued his study under George Saunders in Syracuse University's graduate writing program.[3] He later worked as a junior editor at Esquire[4] and is currently the Director of Creative Writing at Bryn Mawr College and former editor of The Kenyon Review. His 2012 novella "The Sensualist" won the National Jewish Book Award for debut fiction.

Torday's first novel, The Last Flight of Poxl West, was published in hardcover by St. Martin's Press in 2015.[5] The book was the winner of the 2015 National Jewish Book Award for Fiction,[6][7] and was awarded the Sami Rohr Choice Prize[8] in 2017.

Torday's second full-length novel, Boomer1, was published by St. Martin's Press in hardcover in 2018.[9]

Critical reception

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"The Last Fight of Poxl West" received a glowing review from Michiko Kakutani in The New York Times[10] and was featured on the cover of the New York Times Book Review[11] where Teddy Wayne referred to it as an "expertly crafted first novel." It was also named one of Amazon.com's Best Debuts of 2015[12] and was longlisted for the International Dublin Literary Award.[13] At the time of the book's publication, Torday was a guest on Fresh Air with Terry Gross[14] to discuss the book. He said the novel was partially based on his grandfather having falsified government papers to hide his Jewish ancestry, in order to ensure his family's survival during World War II.[14]

Nouvella Books published Torday's first book-length work, The Sensualist,[15] in 2012. It too won a National Jewish Book Award, this one for their debut fiction category. His short stories and essays have appeared in The New York Times,[16] NPR,[17] The Paris Review Daily,[18] Esquire Magazine, The Kenyon Review[19] and Tin House magazine, and have been honored in both the Best American Short Stories and Best American Essays series.

Works

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  • The Sensualist, Nouvella, 2011 ISBN 978-0983658542
  • The Last Flight of Poxl West, Picador, 2016, ISBN 978-1250081605
  • Boomer1, St. Martin's Press, 2018, ISBN 978-1250191793

References

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  1. ^ "Bio". Daniel Torday. Retrieved 2017-12-19.
  2. ^ "Dan Torday | Bryn Mawr College". www.brynmawr.edu. Retrieved 2017-12-19.
  3. ^ Leichter, Hilary (28 April 2015). "Cutting Past the Quick, an interview with Daniel Torday, author of The Last Flight of Poxl West". Electric Literature. Retrieved 1 April 2018. In moments of retrospection after a book comes out, probably it can't hurt to acknowledge one's mentors. So the oddly proper-nouny answer to this question is: George Saunders. I left a good job at Esquire Magazine to head up to the Syracuse MFA program, where I hoped to sit at George's foot.
  4. ^ "The Rumpus Interview with Daniel Torday". The Rumpus. Retrieved 1 April 2018.
  5. ^ "The Last Flight of Poxl West | Daniel Torday | Macmillan". US Macmillan. Retrieved 2017-12-19.
  6. ^ "The Last Flight of Poxl West: A Novel by Daniel Torday | Jewish Book Council". www.jewishbookcouncil.org (in Brazilian Portuguese). Retrieved 2017-12-19.
  7. ^ "Past Winners". Jewish Book Council. Retrieved 2020-01-19.
  8. ^ "Meet 2017 Sami Rohr Prize for Jewish Literature Finalist Daniel Torday, Author of 'The Last Flight of Poxl West". www.jewishbookcouncil.org (in Brazilian Portuguese). May 2017. Retrieved 2017-12-19.
  9. ^ Torday, Daniel (2018-09-18). Boomer1: A Novel. St. Martin's Press. ISBN 9781250191793.
  10. ^ Kakutani, Michiko (2015-03-05). "Review: 'The Last Flight of Poxl West' by Daniel Torday". The New York Times. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved 2017-12-19.
  11. ^ Wayne, Teddy (2015-03-13). "'The Last Flight of Poxl West,' by Daniel Torday". The New York Times. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved 2017-12-19.
  12. ^ "Amazon.com: Best Books of 2015: Books". Amazon. Retrieved 2017-12-19.
  13. ^ "The Last Flight of Poxl West | International DUBLIN Literary Award". www.dublinliteraryaward.ie. Retrieved 2017-12-19.
  14. ^ a b "WWII Novel-Memoir Explores The Blurry Line Between Fact And Fiction". NPR.org. Retrieved 2017-12-19.
  15. ^ "Daniel Torday's Novella, The Sensualist » Nouvella". Nouvella. Retrieved 2017-12-19.
  16. ^ Torday, Daniel (2015-05-05). "'Look Who's Back,' With a Resurrected Adolf Hitler". The New York Times. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved 2017-12-19.
  17. ^ "Searching For Meaning After A Jewish Cemetery Is Desecrated". NPR.org. Retrieved 2017-12-19.
  18. ^ Torday, Daniel (2015-02-19). "A Writer in the Family". The Paris Review. Retrieved 2017-12-19.
  19. ^ "Undress | Kenyon Review Online". www.kenyonreview.org. Retrieved 2017-12-19.