Biography

2009

Mahler's Body

David Schiff : Music

Gustav Mahler's embrace of Germanness and battles with anti-Semitism.
Not Easy Being Greene

Michelle Orange : Letters

A Life in Letters as chronicled by the determinedly elusive Graham Greene.
This Small Extravagance

James Longenbach : Theater

Writing a biography of the mind of Shakespeare is a challenge that requires the ingenuity of an artist.
An Alienation Artist

Alexander Provan : Literary Criticism

Unraveling the Kafkaesque mystique of Franz Kafka.
In His League

Scott Sherman

An affectionate and absorbing oral history raises questions of whether George Plimpton's amiable exterior concealed a man without qualities.

That Girl

Rick Perlstein : History

Was Patty Hearst really a rebel in search of a cause?
Her Nature Was Future

Ange Mlinko : Poetry

The intimate friendship of Emily Dickinson and Thomas Wentworth Higginson takes wing in two new books.
Naipaul's Darkness

Scott Sherman

Biographer Patrick French offers a vivid, sometimes enthralling portrait of a deeply enigmatic writer.
Walter Benjamin Forever

Noah Isenberg : Philosophy

Following the quirky, revolutionary life path of one of the most celebrated twentieth-century intellectuals.
A Hungry Mind

Paula Findlen : Non-Fiction

Ingrid Rowland's Giordano Bruno rediscovers the Renaissance philosopher and heretic.
An Unlikely King

Bernard Avishai : Middle East

An authoritative new biography of Jordan's King Hussein offers an absorbing diplomatic history of the Middle East.
The James Gang

Brenda Wineapple : Books, Literature, & Ideas

In Henry James and his family, biographers find a fascinating story of dynastic melodrama.
Green Days

Anson Rabinbach : Foreign Leaders & Political Figures

The biography of Joschka Fischer tells the story of postwar Germany.
Bella's Way

Nona Willis Aronowitz : Feminism & Women

They just don't make women politicians like Bella Abzug anymore.

Pointe Work

Marina Harss : Non-Fiction

Nureyev: The Life brings new focus to an iconic figure of modern ballet.
Play It (Over and Over Again)

Travis A. Jackson : Jazz

Ben Ratliff's not-quite biography of John Coltrane considers the jazz legend's enduring influence.
The Imperfectionist

Barry Schwabsky : Fine Art

Reconsidering the life and legacy of avant-garde artist and poet Francis Picabia.