John Colapinto (born in 1958) is a Canadian journalist, author and novelist and a staff writer at ''
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 ...
''. In 2000, he wrote 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 ...
'' bestseller ''
As Nature Made Him: The Boy Who Was Raised as a Girl'', which exposed the details of the
David Reimer
David Reimer (born Bruce Peter Reimer; 22 August 1965 – 4 May 2004) was a Canadian man born male but raised as a girl following medical advice and intervention after his penis was severely injured during a botched circumcision in infancy. ...
case, a boy who had undergone a sex change in infancy—a medical experiment long heralded as a success, but which was, in fact, a failure.
Career
Before working on staff at ''The New Yorker'', Colapinto's articles appeared in ''
Vanity Fair'', ''
Esquire'', ''
Mademoiselle'', ''
Us'', ''
New York'' and ''
The New York Times Magazine
''The New York Times Magazine'' is an American Sunday magazine supplement included with the Sunday edition of ''The New York Times''. It features articles longer than those typically in the newspaper and has attracted many notable contributors. ...
'', and in 1995 he became a contributing editor at ''
Rolling Stone
''Rolling Stone'' is an American monthly magazine that focuses on music, politics, and popular culture. It was founded in San Francisco, California, in 1967 by Jann Wenner, and the music critic Ralph J. Gleason. It was first known for its ...
''.
Writing
For ''Rolling Stone'', Colapinto wrote feature stories on a variety of subjects including AIDS, kids and guns, heroin in the music business, and ''Penthouse'' magazine creator,
Bob Guccione
Robert Charles Joseph Edward Sabatini Guccione ( ; December 17, 1930 – October 20, 2010) was an American photographer and publisher. He founded the adult magazine '' Penthouse'' in 1965. This was aimed at competing with Hugh Hefner's ''Playboy' ...
.
In 1998, Colapinto published a 20,000 word feature story in ''Rolling Stone'' titled "The True Story of John/Joan", an account of
David Reimer
David Reimer (born Bruce Peter Reimer; 22 August 1965 – 4 May 2004) was a Canadian man born male but raised as a girl following medical advice and intervention after his penis was severely injured during a botched circumcision in infancy. ...
, who had undergone a sex change in infancy following a botched
circumcision
Circumcision is a procedure that removes the foreskin from the human penis. In the most common form of the operation, the foreskin is extended with forceps, then a circumcision device may be placed, after which the foreskin is excised. Top ...
in which he lost his penis. The medical experiment had been long heralded as a success, but was, in fact, a failure. The story, which detailed not only Reimer's tortured life, but the medical scandal surrounding its cover-up, won the ASME Award for reporting. In 2000, Colapinto published a book-length account of the case, ''As Nature Made Him: The Boy Who Was Raised as a Girl''. The book was a ''New York Times'' bestseller and the film rights were bought by director
Peter Jackson. Reimer took his life in 2004.
Colapinto also wrote a novel, ''About the Author'', a tale of literary envy and theft. It was published in August 2001 and was a number six pick on the
Book Sense
IndieBound is a marketing movement for independent bookstores launched in 2008 by the American Booksellers Association. With resources targeted for "indie" booksellers, it promotes fiscal localism. IndieBound's curated reading lists include the I ...
76 list of best novels of the season; it was a nominee for the
International Dublin Literary Award
The International Dublin Literary Award ( ga, Duais Liteartha Idirnáisiúnta Bhaile Átha Chliath), established as the International IMPAC Dublin Literary Award in 1996, is presented each year for a novel written or translated into English. ...
and for a number of years was under option by
DreamWorks where playwright
Patrick Marber
Patrick Albert Crispin Marber (born 19 September 1964) is an English comedian, playwright, director, actor, and screenwriter.
Early life
Marber was born and raised in a middle-class Jewish family in Wimbledon, London, the son of Angela (Benja ...
wrote a screen adaptation. The film rights to the novel have since been acquired by producer
Scott Rudin
Scott Rudin (born July 14, 1958) is an American film, television, and theatre producer. His films include the Academy Award-winning Best Picture ''No Country for Old Men,'' as well as '' Uncut Gems'', '' Lady Bird, Fences, The Girl with the Drag ...
.
Colapinto's second novel, ''Undone'', a satire hingeing on faux-incest, was published by HarperCollins Canada in April 2015. It was rejected by 41 US publishers and every publisher in Europe on grounds that it was too challenging in its subject matter. A newspaper feature story in ''
The Globe and Mail
''The Globe and Mail'' is a Canadian newspaper printed in five cities in western and central Canada. With a weekly readership of approximately 2 million in 2015, it is Canada's most widely read newspaper on weekdays and Saturdays, although it ...
'' gave an account of the novel's universal rejection in Colapinto's adopted country. A highly positive review in the ''
Toronto Star
The ''Toronto Star'' is a Canadian English-language broadsheet daily newspaper. The newspaper is the country's largest daily newspaper by circulation. It is owned by Toronto Star Newspapers Limited, a subsidiary of Torstar Corporation and pa ...
'' called ''Undone'' "an equally inventive but bolder novel" than Colapinto's debut
a review in the Globe and Mailcalled the novel "a noir that, like Francine Prose's ''Blue Angel'' and Philip Roth's ''American Pastoral'', details the unravelling of the moral American man and his world."
In June 2015, Colapinto spoke about the novel, and its difficult publishing history, o
the CBC Radio program "q"
The novel has since been acquired by independent publisher, Soft Skull Press, a division of Counterpoint Press, based in Berkeley, California. ''Undone'' will be published in April 2016 in the United States. Trade magazine ''
Booklist
''Booklist'' is a publication of the American Library Association that provides critical reviews of books and audiovisual materials for all ages. ''Booklist''s primary audience consists of libraries, educators, and booksellers. The magazine is av ...
'' gave the novel a starred review that said: "Cannily over the top in its comic depravity and magnetizing in its sympathy, Colapinto’s battle royal of innocence and evil, blindness and illumination, betrayal and love will thrill those who enjoy subversively erotic and suspenseful fiction of the finest execution and most cutting implications."
In April 2016, ''The New York Times'' published an article, "Colapinto's Complaint," that described the novel as reviving the "male-centric literary sex novel." The article sparked a two-day tweet storm in which Colapinto was excoriated for resurrecting the "male gaze" in fiction.
As a staff writer for ''The New Yorker'', Colapinto has written about subjects as diverse as
medicinal leeches;
Sotheby's
Sotheby's () is a British-founded American multinational corporation with headquarters in New York City. It is one of the world's largest brokers of fine and decorative art, jewellery, and collectibles. It has 80 locations in 40 countries, an ...
auctioneer
Tobias Meyer
Tobias Meyer (born 1962/1963) is a German-born, New York-based art dealer.
Early life
Meyer was born near Frankfurt, Germany, and earned a degree from the University of Vienna in 1988.
Career
Meyer started work for Christie's in London as a junio ...
; fashion designers
Karl Lagerfeld
Karl Otto Lagerfeld (; 10 September 1933 – 19 February 2019) was a German fashion designer, creative director, artist and photographer.
He was known as the creative director of the French fashion house Chanel, a position held from 1983 ...
and
Rick Owens
Richard Saturnino Owens (born November 18, 1962) is an American fashion designer from Porterville, California. In addition to his main line, Owens has a furniture line and a number of diffusion lines.
Early life and education
Richard Saturnino ...
; the
linguistic oddities of the
Pirahã people
The Pirahã (pronounced ) are an indigenous people of the Amazon Rainforest in Brazil. They are the sole surviving subgroup of the Mura people, and are hunter-gatherers. They live mainly on the banks of the Maici River in Humaitá and Manicoré i ...
(an Amazonian tribe); and
Paul McCartney
Sir James Paul McCartney (born 18 June 1942) is an English singer, songwriter and musician who gained worldwide fame with the Beatles, for whom he played bass guitar and shared primary songwriting and lead vocal duties with John Lennon. One ...
. His piece on the Pirahã was anthologized in ''The Best American Science and Nature Writing'' (2008); his ''New Yorker'' story about
retail loss prevention was included in ''The Best American Crime Reporting'' (2009);
and his ''New Yorker'' profile of neuroscientist
V.S. Ramachandran
Vilayanur Subramanian Ramachandran (born 10 August 1951) is an Indian-American neuroscientist. He is known for his wide-ranging experiments and theories in behavioral neurology, including the invention of the mirror box. Ramachandran is a disti ...
was selected by
Freeman Dyson
Freeman John Dyson (15 December 1923 – 28 February 2020) was an English-American theoretical physicist and mathematician known for his works in quantum field theory, astrophysics, random matrices, mathematical formulation of quantum m ...
for inclusion in ''The Best American Science and Nature Writing''.
Awards and nominations
Colapinto's Guccione story for ''Rolling Stone'' was a finalist for the
ASME Award in profile writing in 2004.
ASME Award for reporting: "The True Story of John/Joan" in 'Rolling Stone''.
Canadian National Magazine Award: "All the Right Moves" (about chess prodigy Jeff Sarwer and his unconventional upbringing): "Saturday Night Magazine," 1987.
Personal life
Colapinto lives in New York City's
Upper East Side
The Upper East Side, sometimes abbreviated UES, is a neighborhood in the borough of Manhattan in New York City, bounded by 96th Street to the north, the East River to the east, 59th Street to the south, and Central Park/Fifth Avenue to the wes ...
. He is married to Donna Mehalko, fashion illustrator, artist, and author of "Mr Wrong, a Users Guide", a humorous take on dating that recommends ways to use Mr Wrong for maximum benefit while waiting for Mr Right; they have one son.
[https://www.bookreporter.com/authors/john-colapinto]
He plays keyboards and sings with the Sequoias, a band made up mostly of New York magazine journalists.
Bibliography
Books
*
*
*
*
Essays and reporting
* Profile of
Esperanza Spalding
Esperanza Emily Spalding (born October 18, 1984) is an American bassist, singer, songwriter, and composer. Her accolades include five Grammy Awards, a Boston Music Award, and a Soul Train Music Award.
A native of Portland, Oregon, Spalding ...
.
*
*
*
Critical studies and reviews
* Review of ''Undone''.
References
External links
Portrait photoin ''
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 ...
s contributor's profile
Colapinto staff articlesin ''The New Yorker''
{{DEFAULTSORT:Colapinto, John
1958 births
Living people
21st-century Canadian novelists
Canadian male novelists
Canadian non-fiction writers
Journalists from Toronto
The New Yorker people
The New Yorker staff writers
Writers from Toronto
21st-century Canadian male writers
Canadian male non-fiction writers
Upper Canada College alumni