Claire Alexandra Styron known as Alexandra Styron, is an American author and professor.
Early life and education
Styron is the youngest child of author
William Styron
William Clark Styron Jr. (June 11, 1925 – November 1, 2006) was an American novelist and essayist who won major literary awards for his work.
Styron was best known for his novels, including:
* '' Lie Down in Darkness'' (1951), his acclaimed fi ...
and poet and human rights activist Rose Burgunder. She grew up in
Roxbury, Connecticut, and in
Martha’s Vineyard
Martha's Vineyard, often simply called the Vineyard, is an island in the Northeastern United States, located south of Cape Cod in Dukes County, Massachusetts, known for being a popular, affluent summer colony. Martha's Vineyard includes the s ...
. Styron attended
Barnard College
Barnard College of Columbia University is a private women's liberal arts college in the borough of Manhattan in New York City. It was founded in 1889 by a group of women led by young student activist Annie Nathan Meyer, who petitioned Columbia ...
, and later the MFA Creative Writing program at
Columbia University
Columbia University (also known as Columbia, and officially as Columbia University in the City of New York) is a private research university in New York City. Established in 1754 as King's College on the grounds of Trinity Church in Manhatt ...
.
Career
After a brief stint as an actress, Styron turned to writing and is the author of several books. Her most-noted work, 2011 memoir ''Reading My Father,'' detailed her life growing up with the Pulitzer Prize-winning novelist and explored his decades-long struggle with major clinical depression. The book was published by Scribner to strong reviews. In ''The New York Times'' Book Review, James Campbell described the book as “brilliant and shocking.” ''Reading My Father'' was nominated for the ''L.A. Times'' book award and long-listed for ''The New York Times'' bestseller list.
Styron is a professor in the MFA Creative Writing program at
Hunter College
Hunter College is a public university in New York City. It is one of the constituent colleges of the City University of New York and offers studies in more than one hundred undergraduate and postgraduate fields across five schools. It also admi ...
in New York City.
Selected works
* ''All The Finest Girls'' (2001), a novel;
* ''Reading My Father (''2011), a memoir about her father, author William Styron;
* ''Steal This Country: A Handbook for Resistance, Persistence, and Fixing (Almost) Everything'' (2018),
a young adult guide to activism.
References
External links
*
*
{{DEFAULTSORT:Styron, Alexandra
Living people
20th-century American women writers
21st-century American women writers
20th-century American actresses
People from Roxbury, Connecticut
People from Martha's Vineyard, Massachusetts
Barnard College alumni
Columbia University School of the Arts alumni
Hunter College faculty
Year of birth missing (living people)