Ken Kalfus (born April 9, 1954 in

New York City New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the List of United States cities by population, most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the L ...

) is an American

author An author is the writer of a book, article, play, mostly written work. A broader definition of the word "author" states: "''An author is "the person who originated or gave existence to anything" and whose authorship determines responsibility f ...

and

journalist A journalist is an individual that collects/gathers information in form of text, audio, or pictures, processes them into a news-worthy form, and disseminates it to the public. The act or process mainly done by the journalist is called journalism ...

. Three of his books have been named ''

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 d ...

'' Notable Books of the Year.

Early life and education

He was born in

the Bronx The Bronx () is a borough of New York City, coextensive with Bronx County, in the state of New York. It is south of Westchester County; north and east of the New York City borough of Manhattan, across the Harlem River; and north of the New Y ...

, and grew up in

Plainview, Long Island Plainview is a hamlet and census-designated place (CDP) located near the North Shore of Long Island in the town of Oyster Bay in Nassau County, New York, United States. The population of the CDP was 27,100. The Plainview post office has ...

. Kalfus started college at Sarah Lawrence College, Bronxville, but dropped out after the first year. Kalfus later attended the New School for Social Research in Manhattan and

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 ...

. Kalfus started writing at an early age.

Career

Kalfus and his family have lived in

Paris Paris () is the capital and most populous city of France, with an estimated population of 2,165,423 residents in 2019 in an area of more than 105 km² (41 sq mi), making it the 30th most densely populated city in the world in 2020. S ...

Dublin Dublin (; , or ) is the capital and largest city of Republic of Ireland, Ireland. On a bay at the mouth of the River Liffey, it is in the Provinces of Ireland, province of Leinster, bordered on the south by the Dublin Mountains, a part of th ...

Belgrade Belgrade ( , ;, ; Names of European cities in different languages: B, names in other languages) is the Capital city, capital and List of cities in Serbia, largest city in Serbia. It is located at the confluence of the Sava and Danube rivers a ...

, and

Moscow Moscow ( , US chiefly ; rus, links=no, Москва, r=Moskva, p=mɐskˈva, a=Москва.ogg) is the capital and largest city of Russia. The city stands on the Moskva River in Central Russia, with a population estimated at 13.0 million ...

. He believes his time in other countries keeps his observations fresh and provides him with valuable insights. Kalfus began his career by publishing short stories and now writes novels. His most recent novel was ''Equilateral'' (2013). His previous novel, ''A Disorder Peculiar to the Country'' (2006), was a

National Book Award The National Book Awards are a set of annual U.S. literary awards. At the final National Book Awards Ceremony every November, the National Book Foundation presents the National Book Awards and two lifetime achievement awards to authors. The Nat ...

nominee. His first novel was ''The Commissariat of Enlightenment'' (2003), preceded by short story collections ''PU-239 and Other Russian Fantasies'' (1999) and ''Thirst'' (1998). The latter three works were each chosen among ''The New York Times'' Notable Books of the Year. He published his first book at the age of 44, and achieved favorable critical response. His story collection ''Coup de Foudre'' was published in 2015. The title story is a novella, a thinly veiled fictionalization of Dominique Strauss-Kahn's alleged 2011 sexual assault on a maid in a midtown New York hotel suite. In an interview in ''

Bookslut Jessa Crispin (born c. 1978 in Lincoln, Kansas) is a critic, author, feminist, and the editor-in-chief of ''Bookslut'', a litblog and webzine founded in 2002. She has published three books, most recently ''Why I Am Not A Feminist: A Feminist Mani ...

'', he told the critic Vladislav Davidzon "The news often feeds my imagination, which is why my fiction sometimes plays off topical or historical events...." The 2007

HBO Home Box Office (HBO) is an American premium television network, which is the flagship property of namesake parent subsidiary Home Box Office, Inc., itself a unit owned by Warner Bros. Discovery. The overall Home Box Office business unit is ba ...

movie ''

Pu-239 Plutonium-239 (239Pu or Pu-239) is an isotope of plutonium. Plutonium-239 is the primary fissile isotope used for the production of nuclear weapons, although uranium-235 is also used for that purpose. Plutonium-239 is also one of the three main ...

'' was based on his short story of the same name.

Marriage and family

He is married to

Inga Saffron Inga Saffron (born November 9, 1957) is an American journalist and architecture critic. She won the 2014 Pulitzer Prize for Criticism while writing for ''The Philadelphia Inquirer''. Biography Saffron was raised in Levittown, New York and attende ...

, Pulitzer-winning architecture critic for ''The Philadelphia Inquirer'', with whom he has a daughter, Sky.

Honors

* Finalist for

PEN/Faulkner Award The PEN/Faulkner Award for Fiction is awarded annually by the PEN/Faulkner Foundation to the authors of the year's best works of fiction by living American citizens. The winner receives US$15,000 and each of four runners-up receives US$5000. Fi ...

* ''

Salon Salon may refer to: Common meanings * Beauty salon, a venue for cosmetic treatments * French term for a drawing room, an architectural space in a home * Salon (gathering), a meeting for learning or enjoyment Arts and entertainment * Salon (P ...

'' Book Award *

Pushcart Prize The Pushcart Prize is an American literary prize published by Pushcart Press that honors the best "poetry, short fiction, essays or literary whatnot" published in the small presses over the previous year. Magazine and small book press editors are ...

*2009

Guggenheim Fellowship Guggenheim Fellowships are grants that have been awarded annually since by the John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation to those "who have demonstrated exceptional capacity for productive scholarship or exceptional creative ability in the ar ...

*2009

Pew Fellowships in the Arts A pew () is a long bench seat or enclosed box, used for seating members of a congregation or choir in a church, synagogue or sometimes a courtroom. Overview The first backless stone benches began to appear in English churches in the th ...

References

External links

Three Stories
Madras Press, 2010

Milkweed Editions, 1998
"Meet the Writers: Ken Kalfus"
Barnes and Noble {{DEFAULTSORT:Kalfus, Ken 1954 births American male journalists 21st-century American novelists Living people Writers from the Bronx Pew Fellows in the Arts American male novelists 20th-century American novelists Journalists from New York City 20th-century American journalists PEN/Faulkner Award for Fiction winners 20th-century American male writers 21st-century American male writers Novelists from New York (state) 21st-century American non-fiction writers