Alex Halberstadt is an American nonfiction writer and journalist. He grew up in Moscow and in 1980 came to the United States, where he and his family settled in New York City. He attended

Stuyvesant High School Stuyvesant High School (pronounced ), commonly referred to among its students as Stuy (pronounced ), is a State school, public university-preparatory school, college-preparatory, Specialized high schools in New York City, specialized high school ...

Oberlin College Oberlin College is a Private university, private Liberal arts colleges in the United States, liberal arts college and conservatory of music in Oberlin, Ohio. It is the oldest Mixed-sex education, coeducational liberal arts college in the United S ...

and

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

Halberstadt’s writing has appeared in ''

The New York Times Magazine ''The New York Times Magazine'' is an American Sunday magazine Supplement (publishing), supplement included with the Sunday edition of ''The New York Times''. It features articles longer than those typically in the newspaper and has attracted man ...

'', ''The'' ''New Yorker'', ''

The New York Times Book Review ''The New York Times Book Review'' (''NYTBR'') is a weekly paper-magazine supplement to the Sunday edition of ''The New York Times'' in which current non-fiction and fiction books are reviewed. It is one of the most influential and widely rea ...

'', '' GQ'', ''

Travel + Leisure Travel + Leisure Co. (formerly Wyndham Destinations, Inc. and Wyndham Worldwide Corporation) is an American timeshare company headquartered in Orlando, Florida. It develops, sells, and manages timeshare properties under several vacation ownershi ...

'', ''

Saveur ''Saveur'' is an online gourmet, food, wine, and travel magazine that publishes essays about various world cuisines. The publication was co-founded by Dorothy Kalins, Michael Grossman, Christopher Hirsheimer, and Colman Andrews, who was also the ...

'', ''

Food & Wine ''Food & Wine'' is an American monthly magazine published by Dotdash Meredith. It was founded in 1978 by Ariane and Michael Batterberry. It features recipes, cooking tips, travel information, restaurant reviews, chefs, wine pairings and season ...

'', ''

New York Magazine ''New York'' is an American biweekly magazine concerned with life, culture, politics, and style generally, and with a particular emphasis on New York City. Founded by Milton Glaser and Clay Felker in 1968 as a competitor to ''The New Yorker'', ...

'', '' Grand Street'', ''

The Washington Post ''The Washington Post'' (also known as the ''Post'' and, informally, ''WaPo'') is an American daily newspaper published in Washington, D.C. It is the most widely circulated newspaper within the Washington metropolitan area and has a large nati ...

'', ''

Lucky Peach Momofuku is a culinary brand established by chef David Chang in 2004 with the opening of Momofuku Noodle Bar. It includes restaurants in New York City, Sydney, Toronto, Las Vegas, and Los Angeles (Noodle Bar, Ssäm Bar, Ko, Má Pêche (defunct) ...

'', ''The'' ''Paris Review'', and elsewhere.
Young Heroes of the Soviet Union
'' his family memoir, was named a ''

New York Times Book Review ''The New York Times Book Review'' (''NYTBR'') is a weekly paper-magazine supplement to the Sunday edition of ''The New York Times'' in which current non-fiction and fiction books are reviewed. It is one of the most influential and widely rea ...

'' Editor's Choice and excerpted in ''

The New Yorker ''The New Yorker'' is an American weekly magazine featuring journalism, commentary, criticism, essays, fiction, satire, cartoons, and poetry. Founded as a weekly in 1925, the magazine is published 47 times annually, with five of these issues ...

''. Writing in ''

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 ...

,'' critic Jennifer Szalai called it "a loving and mournful account that’s also skeptical, surprising and often very funny," adding, "it’s the unexpected specificity of Halberstadt’s observations that ultimately make this memoir as lush and moving as it is.“ Halberstadt's critically acclaimed biography
''Lonely Avenue: the Unlikely Life and Times of Doc Pomus''
was named a ''

'' Editor's Choice and a Best Book of 2007 by ''

The Times ''The Times'' is a British daily national newspaper based in London. It began in 1785 under the title ''The Daily Universal Register'', adopting its current name on 1 January 1788. ''The Times'' and its sister paper ''The Sunday Times'' (fou ...

'' (London).

Ben Folds Benjamin Scott Folds (born September 12, 1966) is an American singer-songwriter, musician, and composer, who is the first artistic advisor to the National Symphony Orchestra at the Kennedy Center in Washington, D.C., since May 2017. Folds was th ...

and

Nick Hornby Nicholas Peter John Hornby (born 17 April 1957) is an English writer and lyricist. He is best known for his memoir ''Fever Pitch'' and novels '' High Fidelity'' and '' About a Boy'', all of which were adapted into feature films. Hornby's work f ...

cited it as an inspiration for their collaborative album ''Lonely Avenue''. Halberstadt’s magazine writing was anthologized i
''Best Food Writing 2014''
and ''Best American Food Writing 2018''. In 2013 and 2014 he was nominated for a

James Beard Award The James Beard Foundation Awards are annual awards presented by the James Beard Foundation to recognize chefs, restaurateurs, authors and journalists in the United States. They are scheduled around James Beard's May 5 birthday. The media award ...

, and he appeared at the 2013

New Yorker Festival The New Yorker Festival is an annual event organized by ''The New Yorker'' magazine. It is held in venues in and around New York City, typically in early October, bringing together "a who’s-who of the arts, politics and everything in between." Th ...

. He has received fellowships from

The MacDowell Colony MacDowell is an artist's residency program in Peterborough, New Hampshire, United States, founded in 1907 by composer Edward MacDowell and his wife, pianist and philanthropist Marian MacDowell. Prior to July 2020, it was known as the MacDowell ...

Yaddo Yaddo is an artists' community located on a estate in Saratoga Springs, New York. Its mission is "to nurture the creative process by providing an opportunity for artists to work without interruption in a supportive environment.". On March ...

, and Art OMI at Ledig House. He teaches at

New York University New York University (NYU) is a private research university in New York City. Chartered in 1831 by the New York State Legislature, NYU was founded by a group of New Yorkers led by then-Secretary of the Treasury Albert Gallatin. In 1832, the ...

Bibliography Bibliography (from and ), as a discipline, is traditionally the academic study of books as physical, cultural objects; in this sense, it is also known as bibliology (from ). English author and bibliographer John Carter describes ''bibliography ...

Books

''Young Heroes of the Soviet Union''
Random House. 2020.

Essays and reporting

* * * * * * * * * * * *
"October's Child: The Year I Left the Soviet Union"
''The New Yorker''. April 5, 2020.
Unforeseen Calamities"
''MoMA Magazine''. May 22, 2020.

References

External links

* ttps://www.theparisreview.org/blog/2020/07/21/stalins-bodyguard-an-interview-with-alex-halberstadt/ An interview with Alex Halberstadt in ''The'' ''Paris Review'' {{DEFAULTSORT:Halberstadt, Alex 1970 births American biographers American male biographers Living people Oberlin College alumni Soviet emigrants to the United States The New Yorker people