Grace Paley

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Grace Paley (born Grace Goodside December 11, 1922 in New York City ; died August 22, 2007 in Thetford Hill , Vermont ) was an American writer and political activist.

biography

Grace Goodside was the youngest of three children of Manja and Isaac Goodside (Gutseit), Jewish immigrants from Ukraine (according to other sources: Russia ). Her father had worked his way up to become a general practitioner in the Bronx. Among other motifs, the conflicts and struggle of the immigrants for survival form an essential part of Paley's later literary work.

In 1938 and 1939 she attended Hunter College and then briefly New York University , but did not graduate. In the early 1940s she studied alongside WH Auden at the New School for Social Research . Aude's social commitment and irony are said to have had a major impact on Paley's early work. In 1942 she married the film cameraman Jess Paley and had two children. She separated from Paley soon after, but was not divorced until 1972 to marry landscape architect and writer Robert Nichols.

Early work

After a few years as a secretary and housewife, she turned back to writing in the mid-1950s. In 1959 she managed to publish a collection of eleven short stories under the title The Little Disturbances of Man (German meat birds, later The Little Adversities of Life ). In the contained story The Used-Boy Raisers (dt. The educators of used boys ) and the autobiographical first appears wearing figure Faith Darwin, in later short stories of volumes Enormous Changes at the Last Minute (dt. Tremendous changes at the last minute ) and Later the Same Day (Eng. Later that evening ) returns. Although initially not well received by literary critics as a work by an unknown author, it was highly valued by Philip Roth and the New Yorker , which contributed significantly to the success of the volume. This led to several lectureships, including at Columbia University and the City College of New York , were transferred.

Late work

With the help of her neighbor, the writer Donald Barthelme , she put together a second collection of short stories, which appeared in 1974 under the title Enormous Changes at the Last Minute . They dealt again with questions of race, gender and class and are stylistically part of postmodernism . In 1985 her third volume of short stories was published, Later the Same Day .

Political activities

In addition to her literary work, Paley was also politically active, especially in the fight against the militarization of the United States and the proliferation of nuclear weapons. In the American Friends Service Committee , a coalition of peace groups, she met her second husband Robert Nichols.

With the escalation of the Vietnam War , Paley's political engagement reached a climax. She joined the War Resisters League and became known nationwide when she traveled to Hanoi on a peace mission in 1969 to negotiate the release of prisoners of war. In 1974 she also took part in the World Peace Conference in Moscow . As one of the White House Eleven , she was arrested in 1978 for placing an anti-nuclear banner on the White House lawn .

honors and awards

Works (selection)

  • The Little Disturbances of Man. Short stories. 1959.
    • The little adversities in life. Translation by Sigrid Ruschmeier. Schöffling, Frankfurt am Main 2013, ISBN 978-3-89561-235-0 .
  • Enormous changes at the last minute. Short stories. 1974.
    • Tremendous last minute changes. Translated by Marianne Frisch, Jürg Laederach and Hanna Muschg. Suhrkamp, ​​1985; Neuübers. Sigrid Ruschmeier. Schöffling, Frankfurt am Main 2014, ISBN 978-3-89561-236-7 .
  • Later the same day. Short stories. 1985.
  • Leaning forward. Poems. 1985.
  • 365 Reasons Not to Have Another War. Political non-fiction book. 1989.
  • Long Walks and Intimate Talks. Short stories and poems. 1991.
  • New and Collected Poems. 1992.
  • The Collected Stories. 1994.
  • Begin Again: Collected Poems. 2000.
  • Mother. Short story.
  • Sometimes come and sometimes go. Poems. Translated by Mirko Bonné. Schöffling, Frankfurt am Main 2018, ISBN 978-3-89561-238-1 .

literature

  • Ellen McGrath Smith: Grace Paley. In: The Oxford encyclopedia of American literature. Volume 3. Oxford Univ. Press, Oxford 2004, ISBN 0-19-516726-0 , pp. 344-347.

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Grace Paley: The Long Distance Runner. In: Michael Hanke (Ed.): Study of Literature Interpretations - American Short Stories of the 20th Century. "RUB" No. 17506. Reclam, Stuttgart 1998, [zuer]
  2. ^ Members: Grace Paley. American Academy of Arts and Letters, accessed April 18, 2019 .
  3. ↑ 1000 PeaceWomen Worldwide. Grace Paley , accessed on: April 14, 2018, (In: German digital version of: Verein 1000 Frauen für den Nobel Peace Prize (Ed.): 1000 PeaceWomen Across the Globe , Series: Contrast Book, Verlag Scalo, Zurich 2005).
  4. ↑ earlier translations: 1. Fleischvögel. Translated from Hanna Muschg. Suhrkamp 1971; 2. The small disturbances of mankind. Stories of love. this. Trans .; 3. Stories of love and lovers. Translated by Hanna Johansen -Muschg, Insel, Frankfurt am Main.
  5. ↑ First version: Later on the same day. Translated by Marianne Frisch, Jürg Laederach, Hanna Muschg. Suhrkamp, ​​Frankfurt am Main 1989. (The 2015 edition also contains a glossary, an interview with the author, material on life and work, portrait of the author and translator.)
personal data
SURNAME Paley, Grace
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Goodside, Grace
BRIEF DESCRIPTION American writer and political activist
DATE OF BIRTH December 11, 1922
PLACE OF BIRTH Bronx , New York City, New York, United States
DATE OF DEATH August 22, 2007
Place of death Thetford Hill , Vermont