Rebecca Donner

Last updated
Rebecca Donner
Education University of California, Berkeley (BA)
Columbia University (MFA)
OccupationWriter
Awards National Book Critics Circle Award for Biography (2022)
PEN/Jacqueline Bograd Weld Award for Biography (2022)
Guggenheim Fellowship (2022)
The Chautauqua Prize (2022)

Rebecca Donner is a Canadian-born writer. She is the author of All the Frequent Troubles of Our Days, which won the 2022 National Book Critics Circle Award for Biography, the PEN/Jacqueline Bograd Weld Award, and The Chautauqua Prize [1] [2] She was a 2023 Visiting Scholar at Oxford, [3] and was elected a Fellow of the Royal Historical Society in recognition of her contribution to historical scholarship. [4] She is currently a 2023-2024 Fellow at Harvard. [5]

Contents

Biography

Donner was born in Canada, and during childhood lived in Japan, Michigan, Virginia, and California. [6] [7] She received her BA from the University of California, Berkeley and MFA from Columbia University. [8] [9] She taught writing at Wesleyan University. [10] She wrote “Sunset Terrace,” a novel set in Los Angeles, followed by “Burnout,” a graphic novel about ecoterrorism. [9]

In 2021, Donner published a biography, All the Frequent Troubles of Our Days, of her great-great-aunt, Mildred Harnack, an American who was part of the Nazi resistance in Germany and was executed in 1943 on Hitler's orders. [7] [9] [11] The book won the National Book Critics Circle Award for Biography, the PEN/Jacqueline Bograd Weld Award for Biography, and The Chautauqua Prize [1] [9] [12] [13] [14] [15] All the Frequent Troubles of Our Days was also a finalist for the Los Angeles Times Book Prize and the Plutarch Award, [16] and a shortlisted nominee for the Governor General's Award for English-language non-fiction at the 2022 Governor General's Awards. [17] Pulitzer-Prize-winning biographer Kai Bird praised the book as "a stunning literary achievement." [18] [19]

Donner is an elected Fellow of the Royal Historical Society in recognition of her contribution to historical scholarship. [20] She received a 2022 Guggenheim Fellowship in the general nonfiction category. [21] In 2023, Donner was a Visiting Scholar at Oxford. [3] She is currently a 2023-2024 Fellow at the Harvard Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study at Harvard University. [5]

Awards and honors

Works

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References

  1. 1 2 3 Borgstrom, Megan (2022-06-02). "Rebecca Donner's 'All The Frequent Troubles Of Our Days' Wins 2022 Chautauqua Prize". Chautauqua Institution. Retrieved 2023-07-14.
  2. ↑ "Bio". Rebecca Donner. Retrieved 2022-05-24.
  3. 1 2 3 "Rebecca Donner". oclw.web.ox.ac.uk. Retrieved 2023-07-14.
  4. ↑ https://files.royalhistsoc.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/10/18102908/Fellows-Oct-23_pdf.pdf
  5. 1 2 3 "Rebecca Donner". Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study at Harvard University. Retrieved 2023-07-14.
  6. ↑ "Rebecca Donner". www.goodreads.com. Retrieved 2023-07-14.
  7. 1 2 Patrick, Bethanne (19 August 2021). "How a novelist cracked the real-life story of her Nazi-fighting ancestor". Los Angeles Times . Retrieved 26 February 2023.
  8. ↑ "Alumna Rebecca Donner '01 Wins National Book Critics Circle Award". Columbia - School of the Arts. Retrieved 2022-05-24.
  9. 1 2 3 4
  10. ↑ "Advanced Fiction Writing ENGL 146". owaprod-pub.wesleyan.edu. Retrieved 2022-05-24.
  11. ↑ "Rebecca Donner Tells The Story Of Her Great-Great-Aunt, Executed For Nazi Resistance". NPR.org. Retrieved 2022-05-24.
  12. 1 2 Klein, Julia M. (3 August 2021). "In World War II Berlin, a little-known story of German resistance". The Forward . Retrieved 26 February 2023.
  13. ↑ "All the Frequent Troubles of Our Days by Rebecca Donner: 2021 Biography Finalist". National Book Critics Circle . 2022-03-15. Retrieved 2022-05-24.
  14. ↑ "The National Book Critics Circle Award". National Book Critics Circle . Retrieved 2022-05-24.
  15. ↑ "PEN/Jacqueline Bograd Weld Award for Biography". PEN America. 2020-06-09. Retrieved 2022-05-24.
  16. ↑ "BIO Announces Plutarch Award Finalists". PublishersWeekly.com. Retrieved 2023-07-14.
  17. ↑ "The finalists for the 2022 Governor General's Literary Award for nonfiction". CBC Books . October 12, 2022. Retrieved October 12, 2022.
  18. ↑ Donner, Rebecca (April 7, 2020). All the Frequent Troubles of Our Days. Little, Brown. ISBN   978-0-316-56172-3 – via www.hachettebookgroup.com.
  19. ↑ Borgstrom, Megan (June 2, 2022). "Rebecca Donner's 'All The Frequent Troubles Of Our Days' Wins 2022 Chautauqua Prize". Chautauqua Institution.
  20. ↑ https://files.royalhistsoc.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/10/18102908/Fellows-Oct-23_pdf.pdf
  21. ↑ "Rebecca Donner". John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation. Retrieved 2022-05-24.
  22. ↑ "Rebecca Donner". John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation... Retrieved 2023-07-14.
  23. ↑ Schaub, Michael (2022-03-18). "Announcing the Winners of the 2021 National Book Critics Circle Awards". National Book Critics Circle. Retrieved 2023-07-14.
  24. ↑ "Announcing the 2022 PEN America Literary Awards Winners". PEN America. 2022-02-28. Retrieved 2023-07-14.
  25. ↑ "Mariana Enriquez, Michael Connelly, S.A. Cosby among L.A. Times Book Prize finalists". Los Angeles Times. 2022-02-23. Retrieved 2023-07-14.
  26. ↑ "The finalists for the 2022 Governor General's Literary Award for nonfiction" . Retrieved 2023-07-14.
  27. ↑ "The Plutarch Award". Biographers International Organization. Retrieved 2023-07-14.
  28. ↑ Saldarriaga, Nicole (July 14, 2021). "'All the Frequent Troubles of our Days' by Alumna Rebecca Donner '01 Coming in Early August". School of the Arts. columbia.edu. Retrieved 26 February 2023.
  29. ↑ "All the Frequent Troubles of Our Days: The True Story of the American Woman at the Heart of the German Resistance to Hitler by Rebecca Donner". publishersweekly.com . Retrieved 26 February 2023.
  30. ↑ Donner, Rebecca; Freeman, Jason; Large, David Clay (August 9, 2021). "All the Frequent Troubles of Our Days". C-SPAN video. Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.
  31. ↑ "BURNOUT". Kirkus Reviews . June 1, 2008. Retrieved 26 February 2023.
  32. ↑ "SUNSET TERRACE". Kirkus Reviews . May 21, 2003. Retrieved 26 February 2023.
  33. ↑ "SUNSET TERRACE by Rebecca Donner". publishersweekly.com . Retrieved 26 February 2023.
  34. ↑ Aures, Kam (January 25, 2004). "Rebecca Donner : Sunset Terrace : Book Review". mostlyfiction.com. Retrieved 26 February 2023.
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