Amanda Filipacchi (; born October 10, 1967) is an American novelist. She was born in Paris and educated in both in France and in the U.S. She is the author of four novels, ''
Nude Men
''Nude Men'' is the 1993 debut novel by American writer Amanda Filipacchi. At age twenty-two, she wrote it as her thesis for Columbia University's graduate creative writing program. It was published by Viking in hardback and by Penguin in paperback ...
'' (1993), ''
Vapor'' (1999), ''
Love Creeps
''Love Creeps'' (2005) is the third novel by American writer Amanda Filipacchi. It was translated into French, Italian, Dutch, Russian, Polish, and Korean. It tackles issues of love, desire, obsession, and addiction.
Plot summary
''Love Creeps' ...
'' (2005), and ''
The Unfortunate Importance of Beauty'' (2015). Her fiction has been translated into 13 languages.
Early life and education
Filipacchi was born in Paris, and was educated in France (where she attended the
American School of Paris in St. Cloud
[Ardisson, Thierry]
interview Amanda Filipacchi
''DailyMotion'', INA.fr, putative broadcast date October 17, 2010, retrieved June 6, 2013. See also her earlier
anti-portrait chinois
and her deft replies to Ardisson's verbal challenges.) and in the U.S. She is the daughter of former model
Sondra Peterson and
Daniel Filipacchi
Daniel Filipacchi (born 12 January 1928) is the Chairman Emeritus of Hachette Filipacchi Médias and a French collector of surrealist art.
Career
Filipacchi wrote and worked as a photographer for ''Paris Match'' from its founding in 1949 by J ...
, chairman emeritus of
Hachette Filipacchi Médias
Hachette Filipacchi Médias, S.A. (HFM) is a magazine publisher. It is a wholly owned subsidiary of Lagardère Active, a division of the media conglomerate Lagardère Group of France.
History
''Hachette'' was founded by Louis Hachette (French ...
.
She has been writing since the age of thirteen and completed three unpublished novels in her teenage years.
She has been living in New York since she was 17. She attended
Hamilton College, from which she graduated with a BA in Creative Writing. At age 20, she tried her hand at non-fiction writing at ''
Rolling Stone
''Rolling Stone'' is an American monthly magazine that focuses on music, politics, and popular culture. It was founded in San Francisco, San Francisco, California, in 1967 by Jann Wenner, and the music critic Ralph J. Gleason. It was first kno ...
'' magazine.
[ In 1990, Filipacchi enrolled in ]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 ...
's MFA fiction writing program, where she wrote a master's thesis which she later turned into her first published novel, ''Nude Men
''Nude Men'' is the 1993 debut novel by American writer Amanda Filipacchi. At age twenty-two, she wrote it as her thesis for Columbia University's graduate creative writing program. It was published by Viking in hardback and by Penguin in paperback ...
''.
Career
In 1992, when Filipacchi was 24, a time shortly before her graduation, her agent, Melanie Jackson, sold ''Nude Men'' to Nan Graham at Viking Press
Viking Press (formally Viking Penguin, also listed as Viking Books) is an American publishing company owned by Penguin Random House. It was founded in New York City on March 1, 1925, by Harold K. Guinzburg and George S. Oppenheim and then acquire ...
. The novel was later translated into ten languages and was anthologized in ''The Best American Humor 1994'' (published by Simon & Schuster
Simon & Schuster () is an American publishing company and a subsidiary of Paramount Global. It was founded in New York City on January 2, 1924 by Richard L. Simon and M. Lincoln Schuster. As of 2016, Simon & Schuster was the third largest publ ...
).
Filipacchi's second and third novels, ''Vapor'' (1999) and ''Love Creeps'' (2005, a novel about obsessive love
Obsessive love or obsessive love disorder (OLD) is a proposed condition in which one person feels an overwhelming obsessive desire to possess and protect another person, sometimes with an inability to accept failure or rejection. Symptoms include ...
and stalking respectively), were also translated into multiple languages. In 2005, Filipacchi was invited to participate in the 2005 Saint-Amour literary festival, a 10-city tour through Belgium.
Reviewers have called Filipacchi "a prodigious postfeminist talent", and a "lovely comic surrealist". ''The Boston Globe
''The Boston Globe'' is an American daily newspaper founded and based in Boston, Massachusetts. The newspaper has won a total of 27 Pulitzer Prizes, and has a total circulation of close to 300,000 print and digital subscribers. ''The Boston Glob ...
'' described her writing style as "reminiscent in certain ways of Muriel Spark ... brisk, witty, knowing, mischievous." ''Love Creeps'' (referred to in a review by Alexis Soloski in ''The Village Voice
''The Village Voice'' is an American news and culture paper, known for being the country's first alternative newsweekly. Founded in 1955 by Dan Wolf, Ed Fancher, John Wilcock, and Norman Mailer, the ''Voice'' began as a platform for the crea ...
'' as having "oddball situations and merrily acidic dialogue") was one of ''The Village Voices top 25 books of the year, and was included in the syllabus of a course on the comic novel in 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 ...
's graduate creative writing program.
In August 2013, Filipacchi sold her latest novel, ''The Unfortunate Importance of Beauty'', to Norton Norton may refer to:
Places
Norton, meaning 'north settlement' in Old English, is a common place name. Places named Norton include: Canada
*Rural Municipality of Norton No. 69, Saskatchewan
*Norton Parish, New Brunswick
**Norton, New Brunswick, a ...
. According to the publisher, the novel deals with two women going to elaborate lengths to find love. It was named on Bustle's list of "12 of the Most Anticipated Books of 2015, aka the Titles We Can't Get Our Hands On Soon Enough" and the Huffington Post
''HuffPost'' (formerly ''The Huffington Post'' until 2017 and sometimes abbreviated ''HuffPo'') is an American progressive news website, with localized and international editions. The site offers news, satire, blogs, and original content, and ...
's "2015 Books We Can't Wait To Read".
Wikipedia op-ed
In an April 2013 op-ed
An op-ed, short for "opposite the editorial page", is a written prose piece, typically published by a North-American newspaper or magazine, which expresses the opinion of an author usually not affiliated with the publication's editorial board. O ...
for ''The New York Times
''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid ...
'', Filipacchi expressed concerns about sexism regarding Wikipedia's classification of American novelists, as well as female novelists from other countries, after she noticed multiple editors moving female writers out of the general category of "American novelists" and into a subcategory for "American women novelists". She described it as a "small, easily fixable thing ... that make it harder and slower for women to gain equality in the literary world", and added that " ople who go to Wikipedia to get ideas for whom to hire, or honor, or read, and look at that list of 'American Novelists' for inspiration ... might simply use that list without thinking twice about it." The op-ed spurred an outcry from feminists and other commentators, who echoed her concerns about sexism and the perceived minimization of female novelists on the site. Filipacchi stated in a follow-up piece that editors had targeted her Wikipedia biography page in retaliation for her criticism. Andrew Leonard
Andrew Leonard (born 1962) is an American journalist who writes feature articles for ''San Francisco'' and contributes to Medium. From 1995 to 2014 he wrote for ''Salon.com''. He has also written for ''Wired''.
Career
Leonard is credited with coi ...
of Salon described this as "revenge editing" and supported his description of the event by quoting combative remarks about Filipacchi made by the primary user involved, who was later revealed to be writer Robert Clark Young
Since the launch of Wikipedia in January 2001, several controversies have occurred. Wikipedia's open nature, in which anyone can edit most articles, has led to various concerns, such as the quality of writing, the amount of vandalism, and the ac ...
.
Filipacchi later wrote an additional article in ''The Atlantic
''The Atlantic'' is an American magazine and multi-platform publisher. It features articles in the fields of politics, foreign affairs, business and the economy, culture and the arts, technology, and science.
It was founded in 1857 in Boston, ...
'', rebutting media stories that attributed the recategorization of female novelists to the work of a single editor, and listed seven different users who were responsible for recategorizing the seventeen women writers mentioned in her op-ed. In July 2013, she wrote a personal essay for ''The Wall Street Journal
''The Wall Street Journal'' is an American business-focused, international daily newspaper based in New York City, with international editions also available in Chinese and Japanese. The ''Journal'', along with its Asian editions, is published ...
,'' which more humorously described the aftermath of the controversy, discussing how she became engrossed in discussions on Wikipedia and criticism site Wikipediocracy
Wikipediocracy is a website for discussion and criticism of Wikipedia. Its members have brought information about List of Wikipedia controversies, Wikipedia's controversies to the attention of the media. The site was founded in March 2012 by users ...
.
Works
Books
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Other publications
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References
External links
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{{DEFAULTSORT:Filipacchi, Amanda
Living people
Hamilton College (New York) alumni
Columbia University School of the Arts alumni
1967 births
Amanda
Amanda is a Latin feminine gerundive (i.e. verbal adjective) name meaning, literally, “she who must (or is fit to) be loved”. Other translations, with similar meaning, could be "deserving to be loved," "worthy of love," or "loved very much b ...
French people of Italian descent
Postmodern writers
Magic realism writers
Writers from New York City
Writers from Paris
20th-century American novelists
21st-century American novelists
American women novelists
20th-century French novelists
21st-century French novelists
French women novelists
Critics of Wikipedia
20th-century American women writers
21st-century American women writers
Novelists from New York (state)
20th-century French women
21st-century French women