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Kirsty Gunn

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Kirsty Gunn (born 1960, New Zealand) is a novelist, essayist, short story writer, and professor of creative writing. She has won the Scottish Arts Council Book of the Year award, the New Zealand Post Book Awards Book of the Year award, and the Edge Hill Short Story Prize.

Education and academic career

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Gunn studied at Victoria University and Oxford University.[1]

She has taught creative writing at Oxford University.[1] She is currently a Professor in Creative Writing at the University of Dundee[1][2] and a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature,[3] the Royal Literary Fund,[4] and the Royal Society of Edinburgh.[5]

Writing career

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Gunn's debut, the short novel "Rain", was published in 1994.[6][7] In 2001, the novel was adapted as both a film of the same name, directed by Christine Jeffs,[8] and as a ballet by the Rosas Company, set to "Music for Eighteen Musicians", a 1976 score by Steve Reich.[9]

Gunn's first collection of short stories, This Place You Return To Is Home, was published in 1999 and received a Scottish Arts Council Bursary for Literature.[9][1] The collection included a story, 'Tinsel Bright', that was selected for The Faber Book of Contemporary Stories About Childhood in 1997.[10]

Her fourth novel, The Boy and the Sea, was published in 2006. It won the Scottish Arts Council Book of the Year award in 2007.[2]

Her 2012 novel "The Big Music" won the Book of the Year in the 2013 New Zealand Post Book Awards.[11][12] The novel took seven years to write, and was inspired by pibroch, the classical music of the Great Highland Bagpipe.[13]

Gunn's 2014 short story collection, Infidelities, won the Edge Hill Short Story Prize[14] and was shortlisted for the Frank O'Connor Award.[15]

Gunn's most recent novel, Caroline's Bikini, was published in 2018. A metafictional romance, The Guardian described it as "bold and brainy" but "frustrating".[16] The Times Literary Supplement described it as "a clever, sly novel about the nature of the fictional and the real".[17]

In 2024, Gunn published her third short fiction collection, Pretty Ugly.[18][19]

Gunn has also published works that combine essay, fiction and autobiography, including 44 Things (2007)[9][20][21] and My Katherine Mansfield Project (2015) (published in New Zealand as Thorndon: Wellington and Home: My Katherine Mansfield Project).[22][23][24]

Bibliography

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  • 1994: Rain
  • 1997: The Keepsake
  • 1999: This Place You Return To Is Home
  • 2002: Featherstone
  • 2006: The Boy and the Sea
  • 2007: 44 Things
  • 2012: The Big Music
  • 2014: Infidelities
  • 2015: My Katherine Mansfield Project
  • 2016: Going Bush
  • 2018: Caroline's Bikini
  • 2024: Pretty Ugly

References

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  1. ^ a b c d "Professor Kirsty Gunn". Dundee University. Retrieved 13 January 2025.
  2. ^ a b "Sundial Scottish Arts Council Book of the Year 2007 - Winner announced". Scottish Arts Council. 18 August 2007. Archived from the original on 5 June 2012. Retrieved 22 August 2012.
  3. ^ "RSL 200: Kirsty Gunn FRSL". Royal Society of Literature. Retrieved 13 January 2025.
  4. ^ "Kirsty Gunn". Royal Literary Fund. Retrieved 13 January 2025.
  5. ^ "Dundee academics elected Fellows of the RSE". University of Dundee. Retrieved 13 January 2025.
  6. ^ "Rain". Faber. Retrieved 13 January 2025.
  7. ^ "rev. of Rain by Kirsty Gunn". Ploughshares. Retrieved 13 January 2025.
  8. ^ "Rain". The Guardian. Retrieved 13 January 2025.
  9. ^ a b c "Kirsty Gunn". Academy of New Zealand Literature. Retrieved 13 January 2025.
  10. ^ The Faber Book of Contemporary Stories about Childhood. Faber and Faber. 1997. ISBN 0571170838.
  11. ^ Dass, Kiran. "Kirsty Gunn". Unity Books. Retrieved 29 August 2013.
  12. ^ Thorpe, Adam (27 July 2012). "The Big Music by Kirsty Gunn – review". The Guardian. Retrieved 22 August 2012.
  13. ^ Thought, The. "Kirsty Gunn on 'The Big Music'". The Thought Fox. Retrieved 25 August 2012.
  14. ^ "The Edge Hill Short Story Prize". Edge Hill University. Retrieved 13 January 2025.
  15. ^ "Kirsty Gunn wins major short story award". University of Dundee. Retrieved 13 January 2025.
  16. ^ "Caroline's Bikini by Kirsty Gunn – review". The Guardian. Retrieved 13 January 2025.
  17. ^ "The great engine of unrequited love". TLS. Retrieved 13 January 2025.
  18. ^ "Pretty Ugly by Kirsty Gunn". New Zealand Review of Books. Retrieved 13 January 2025.
  19. ^ "Pretty Ugly". Caught by the River. Retrieved 13 January 2025.
  20. ^ "44 Things: My Year at Home". Retrieved 13 January 2025.
  21. ^ "You ask me if I'm lonely". The Guardian. Retrieved 13 January 2025.
  22. ^ "Homesick Blues". TLS. Retrieved 13 January 2025.
  23. ^ "My Katherine Mansfield Project". Books from Scotland. Retrieved 13 January 2025.
  24. ^ "Talking with Kirsty Gunn". The New Zealand Herald. Retrieved 13 January 2025.
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