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Dave Eggers

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Dave Eggers
Dave Eggers at the 2005 Hay Festival
Dave Eggers at the 2005 Hay Festival
BornMarch 12 1970
Chicago, Illinois
Pen nameDaniel O'Mara, Lucy Thomas, Dr. and Mr. Doris Haggis-On-Whey, others
Occupationwriter, editor, publisher
Nationality United States
Genrefiction, memoir, humor
Website
McSweeney's Internet Tendency

Dave Eggers (born March 12, 1970) is an American writer, editor, and publisher.

Life

Eggers was born in Chicago, Illinois, grew up in suburban Lake Forest, and attended the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.[1] He lives in San Francisco and is married to the writer Vendela Vida.[2] In October 2005, Vendela gave birth to a daughter, October Adelaide Eggers Vida.[3]

Eggers's brother Bill is a researcher who has worked for several conservative think tanks, doing research on privatization.[4] His sister, Beth, claimed that Eggers grossly understated her role in raising their brother Toph and made use of her journals in writing A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius without compensating her.[5] She later recanted her claims in a posting on her brother's own website McSweeney's Internet Tendency, calling them "a really terrible LaToya Jackson moment."[6] On March 1 2002, the New York Post reported that Beth, then a lawyer in Modesto, California, had committed suicide.[7] Eggers briefly spoke about his sister's death during a 2002 fan interview for McSweeney's.[8]

Work

Eggers began writing as a Salon.com editor and founded Might magazine, while also writing a comic strip called Smarter Feller (originally Swell, then Smart Feller) for SF Weekly.[9] His first book was a memoir (with fictional elements), A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius (2000). It focuses on the author's struggle to raise his younger brother in San Francisco following the sudden deaths of their parents. The book quickly became a bestseller and was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize for General Non-Fiction. The memoir was praised for its originality, idiosyncratic self-referencing, and for several innovative stylistic elements. Early printings of the 2001 trade-paperback edition were published with a lengthy, apologetic postscript entitled "Mistakes We Knew We Were Making".

In 2002, Eggers published his first novel, You Shall Know Our Velocity, a story about a frustrating attempt to give away money to deserving people while haphazardly traveling the globe. An expanded and revised version was released as Sacrament in 2003 and retitled You Shall Know Our Velocity! for its Vintage imprint distribution. He has since published a collection of short stories, How We Are Hungry, and three politically-themed serials for Salon.com.[10] In November 2005, Eggers published Surviving Justice: America's Wrongfully Convicted and Exonerated, compiling the book of interviews with exonerees once sentenced to death. The book was compiled with Lola Vollen, "a physician specializing in the aftermath of large-scale human rights abuses" and "a visiting scholar at the University of California, Berkeley's Institute of International Studies and a practicing clinician."[11] Novelist Scott Turow wrote the introduction to Surviving Justice. Eggers's most recent novel, What Is the What: The Autobiography of Valentino Achak Deng (McSweeney's, 2006), was a finalist for the 2006 National Book Critics Circle Award for Fiction.[12] Eggers is also the editor of the Best American Nonrequired Reading series, an annual anthology of short stories, essays, journalism, satire, and alternative comics.

Eggers is the founder of McSweeney's, an independent publishing house. McSweeney's produces a quarterly literary journal, McSweeney's, first published in 1998; a monthly journal, The Believer, which debuted in 2003 and is edited by wife Vida; and, beginning in 2005, a quarterly DVD magazine, Wholphin. Other works include The Future Dictionary of America, Created in Darkness by Troubled Americans, and the "Dr. and Mr. Haggis-On-Whey" children's books, which Eggers writes with his younger brother. Ahead of the 2006 FIFA World Cup, Eggers wrote an essay about the US national team and soccer in the United States for The Thinking Fan's Guide to the World Cup, a book published with aid of the journal Granta, that contained essays about each competing team in the tournament.

Eggers currently teaches writing in San Francisco at 826 Valencia, a nonprofit tutoring center and writing school for children that he cofounded in 2002. Eggers has recruited volunteers to operate similar programs in Los Angeles, New York City, Seattle, Chicago, and Ann Arbor, Michigan, all under the auspices of the nonprofit organization 826 National.[13] In 2006, he appeared at a series of fundraising events, dubbed the Revenge of the Book–Eaters tour, to support these programs. The Chicago show, at the Park West theatre, featured Death Cab for Cutie frontman Ben Gibbard. Other performers on the tour included Sufjan Stevens, Jon Stewart and David Byrne.[14]

Bibliography

Nonfiction

Fiction

Humour books

  • Giraffes? Giraffes! (as Dr. and Mr. Doris Haggis-On-Whey, co-authored with Christopher Eggers) (2003)
  • Your Disgusting Head (as Dr. and Mr. Doris Haggis-On-Whey, co-authored with Christopher Eggers) (2004)
  • Animals of the Ocean, in Particular the Giant Squid (as Dr. and Mr. Doris Haggis-On-Whey, co-authored with Christopher Eggers) (2006)

Other

  • Jokes Told in Heaven about Babies (as Lucy Thomas) (2003)
  • Salon.com serials: "The Unforbidden Is Compulsory Or, Optimism", "The Fishmonger Returns", and "New Hampshire Is for Lovers" (2004)
  • Screenplay Adaptation of the children's book Where the Wild Things Are

As editor or contributor (non-McSweeney's publications)

Misc

  • Eggers went to high school with Vince Vaughn.[15]
  • Eggers reportedly turned down a $2 million movie deal from New Line and Miramax.[16]
  • In 2005 Eggers designed the artwork for Thrice's fourth studio album, Vheissu.
  • From the 2006 movie John Tucker Must Die: "She likes old-school Elvis Costello, listens to obscure podcasts and she reads Dave Eggers. She's deep."[17]
  • On Beck's 2006 album The Information, Eggers can be heard talking with Spike Jonze during the final track, "The Horrible Fanfare/Landslide/Exoskeleton". The third section of the track features Eggers and Jonze responding to Beck's question "What would the ultimate record that ever could possibly be made sound like?"[18]

References

  1. ^ ""Four prize-winning authors taking part in U. of I. series that begins Feb. 8" by Andrea Lynn". News Bureau, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. January 23 2007. Retrieved 2007-02-16. {{cite web}}: Check date values in: |date= (help)
  2. ^ ""Vendela Vida floats amid S.F. literati but keeps feet, attitude firmly planted" by Joshunda Sanders". San Francisco Chronicle. August 27 2003. Retrieved 2007-02-22. {{cite web}}: Check date values in: |date= (help)
  3. ^ ""Different worlds: The many lives—novelist, social activist, literary innovator, teacher—of Dave Eggers" by Susan Larson". The Times-Picayune [New Orleans]. February 06 2007. Retrieved 2007-02-22. {{cite web}}: Check date values in: |date= (help)
  4. ^ "William D. Eggers". Manhattan Institute for Policy Research. undated. Retrieved 2007-02-19. {{cite web}}: Check date values in: |date= (help)
  5. ^ ""FoE! Log #6: The Beth Eggers Exclusive (And Some Other Stuff)"". My Manifesto, by Gary Baum. April 17 2000. Retrieved 2007-02-19. {{cite web}}: Check date values in: |date= (help)
  6. ^ ""FoE! Log #13: A Very Special Edition of The FoE! Log"". My Manifesto, by Gary Baum. July 31 2000. Retrieved 2007-02-21. {{cite web}}: Check date values in: |date= (help) Note: The original page to which this source refers has since been removed from McSweeney's Internet Tendency.
  7. ^ ""More Heartbreak for Author" by Richard Johnson, with Paula Froelich and Chris Wilson". PageSix.com (New York Post online edition) at iWon. March 1 2002. Retrieved 2007-02-21. {{cite web}}: Check date values in: |date= (help); Italic or bold markup not allowed in: |work= (help)
  8. ^ ""Readers Interview Dave Eggers"". McSweeney's Internet Tendency. [2002]. Retrieved 2007-02-19. {{cite web}}: Check date values in: |date= (help)
  9. ^ ""Growing Up in Public: David Eggers and Ann Powers" by Mark Athitakis". SF Weekly. March 8 2000. Retrieved 2007-02-21. {{cite web}}: Check date values in: |date= (help)
  10. ^ ""Introducing (again) Dave Eggers"". Salon.com. [2004]. Retrieved 2007-02-21. {{cite web}}: Check date values in: |date= (help)
  11. ^ ""Surviving Justice: About the Editors"". Voice of Witness. undated. Retrieved 2007-02-20. {{cite web}}: Check date values in: |date= (help)
  12. ^ ""NBCC Awards Finalists"". The National Book Critics Circle, bookcritics.org. undated. Retrieved 2007-03-11. {{cite web}}: Check date values in: |date= (help); External link in |work= (help)
  13. ^ ""826 Chapters"". 826 National. undated. Retrieved 2007-02-20. {{cite web}}: Check date values in: |date= (help)
  14. ^ ""Revenge of the Book–Eaters"". Bookeaters.org. 2006. Retrieved 2007-02-20.
  15. ^ ""FoE! Log #2:Dave Eggers, Vince Vaughn and Me"". My Manifesto, by Gary Baum. March 6 2000. Retrieved 2007-02-21. {{cite web}}: Check date values in: |date= (help)
  16. ^ ""Eggers Surprised By Success" by James Sullivan". San Francisco Chronicle. April 2 2001. Retrieved 2007-02-21. {{cite web}}: Check date values in: |date= (help)
  17. ^ ""Bummer in the Summer" by Dave McCoy and Gregory Ellwood". MSN. [2006]. Retrieved 2007-02-21. {{cite web}}: Check date values in: |date= (help)
  18. ^ "" 'I'm always in danger of being dismissed as a clown' " by Chris Salmon". Guardian Unlimited. September 21 2006. Retrieved 2007-02-21. {{cite web}}: Check date values in: |date= (help)
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