Megan Mayhew Bergman (born December 23, 1979) is an American writer and environmental journalist, author of the books ''Almost Famous Women'', ''Birds of a Lesser Paradise'', and ''How Strange a Season'', and a forthcoming biography on the

International Sweethearts of Rhythm The International Sweethearts of Rhythm was the first integrated all-women's band in the United States. During the 1940s the band featured some of the best female musicians of the day. They played swing and jazz on a national circuit that incl ...

. In 2015, she won the Garrett Award for Fiction.

Life

She graduated from

Duke University Duke University is a private research university in Durham, North Carolina. Founded by Methodists and Quakers in the present-day city of Trinity in 1838, the school moved to Durham in 1892. In 1924, tobacco and electric power industrialist James ...

with a masters and Bennington College with an MFA. She is the author of the short story collections ''Birds of a Lesser Paradise'', ''Almost Famous Women'', and ''How Strange A Season'', which was longlisted for the 2023 Joyce Carol Oates Fiction Prize, the Story Prize, and the Mark Twain American Voice in Literature Award. In 2016, she was awarded a fellowship at the

American Library in Paris The American Library in Paris is the largest English-language lending library on the European mainland. It operates as an independent, non-profit cultural association in France incorporated under the laws of Delaware. Library members have access t ...

. ''

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 ...

'' included ''How Strange A Season'' in its Best Books of 2022. In 2019, she wrote a column for ''

The Guardian ''The Guardian'' is a British daily newspaper. It was founded in 1821 as ''The Manchester Guardian'', and changed its name in 1959. Along with its sister papers ''The Observer'' and ''The Guardian Weekly'', ''The Guardian'' is part of the Gu ...

'' on the American south and climate change, which won the Reed Environmental Journalism Award from the

Southern Environmental Law Center Southern Environmental Law Center (SELC) is the largest 501(c)(3) environmental nonprofit organization in the Southern region, with more than 80 attorneys and 75 staff members working at the local, state, and federal level to protect the environm ...

. She writes regularly for ''The Guardian'' and ''The New Yorker'' on environmental issues, art, and music. She also wrote an environmental column for ''The Paris Review'' in 2016. Her work has twice appeared in Best American Short Stories, and on NPR's Selected Shorts. She served as the Associate Director of the MFA program at Bennington College from 2015–2017, and later the Director of the Robert Frost Stone House Museum. She is now the Director of the Bread Loaf Environmental Writers Conference at Middlebury College, where she also teaches in the undergraduate Creative Writing Department. She lives in

Shaftsbury, Vermont Shaftsbury is a town in Bennington County, Vermont, United States. The population was 3,598 at the 2020 census. History The town was chartered on August 20, 1761. It was named after the Earl of Shaftesbury. In June 1843, escaped slaves hid at ...

with her husband and two daughters. She was a senior fellow at the Conservation Law Foundation in Boston, MA from 2019-2020 and founded a nonprofit called Open Field, dedicated to increasing access to environmental storytelling skills.

Works

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References

External links

* * {{DEFAULTSORT:Bergman, Megan Mayhew 21st-century American novelists American women novelists 1979 births Living people 21st-century American women writers