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Laird Hunt

レアード・ハント

Reādo Hunto

Profile

Gender
Male
Born
1968-04-03 （Singapore）
Nationality
American
Languages
English
Residence History
Amsterdam (childhood) → London (childhood) → Indiana (raised with grandmother) → Boulder (formerly lived) → Providence (current residence)

Career

Occupations
Novelist, Translator, Academic
Active Years
1996-
Affiliations
Brown University (Literary Arts Program), University of Denver (former Creative Writing faculty)
Influenced By
Georges Perec, W. G. Sebald, Samuel Beckett, Franz Kafka, French modernists

Education

Indiana University Bloomington
Degree: BA
Year of Graduation: 1989
Country: United States
Naropa University (Jack Kerouac School)
Creative Writing
Degree: MFA
Year of Graduation: 1996
Country: United States
Studied creative writing at the Jack Kerouac School
Sorbonne (University of Paris)
French literature
Period: 1996
Year of Graduation: 1996
Country: France
Studied French literature (short-term)

Awards

Anisfield-Wolf Book Awards (Fiction)
2013
Work: Kind One
Organization: Anisfield-Wolf Foundation
Result: winner
PEN/Faulkner Award for Fiction
2013
Work: Kind One
Organization: PEN/Faulkner Foundation
Result: finalist
Grand Prix de Littérature Américaine
2015
Work: Neverhome
Organization: Grand Prix de Littérature Américaine (organizers)
Result: winner
National Book Award (Fiction)
2021
Work: Zorrie
Organization: National Book Foundation
Result: finalist
Guggenheim Fellowship
2024
Organization: John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation
Result: recipient

Awards & Nominations

Works

Major Works

Dear Home

1999 Short fiction / Novel

The Paris Stories

2000 Short stories

Indiana, Indiana

2003 Novel

The Exquisite

2006 Novel

Ray of the Star

2009 Novel

Kind One

2012 Short fiction

A collection of short fiction exploring loneliness and human relationships through varied narrative voices.

lonelinesshuman relationshipsmemory

Neverhome

2014 Historical fiction / Literary fiction

A novel set against the American Civil War about a woman who disguises herself as a man to go to war, examining war, identity, and memory.

waridentitymemory
Adaptations
  • [Film (planned)] Neverhome (film project) / Lenny Abrahamson

The Evening Road

2017 Novel

In the House in the Dark of the Woods

2018 Short fiction / Experimental fiction

Zorrie

2021 Novel

Through the life of protagonist Zorrie, the novel sensitively traces everyday American life, memory, and change across the 20th century. Finalist for the 2021 National Book Award.

memoryeveryday lifepassage of time

This Wide Terraqueous World

2023 Short fiction

Bibliography

  • Dear Home (1999)
  • The Paris Stories (2000/2010)
  • The Impossibly (2001/2012)
  • Indiana, Indiana (2003)
  • The Exquisite (2006)
  • Ray of the Star (2009)
  • Kind One (2012)
  • Neverhome (2014)
  • The Evening Road (2017)
  • In the House in the Dark of the Woods (2018)
  • Zorrie (2021)
  • This Wide Terraqueous World (2023)

Adaptations

  • Neverhome film project (director: Lenny Abrahamson, announced 2014 — not realized)

Translations by Author

  • Vacant Lot (translation of a novel by Olivier Rohe)
  • Paul Verlaine (translation)

Style & Themes

Literary Style
experimental prosedifficult yet poetic descriptionsgenre-crossing (literary noir, historical, speculative)
Recurring Motifs
lonelinessmemory and forgettingshifts in identitymovement and drift

Legacy

Recognized as an experimental writer who crosses genres, Hunt is seen as a figure who fuses difficulty with poetic expression in American literature. He has received and been nominated for several awards and is active as a translator and critic.

Trivia

  • Born in Singapore but lived in various Western cities during childhood.
  • Raised in Indiana by his grandmother.
  • Married to poet Eleni Sikelianos.
  • Teaches in Brown University's Literary Arts Program.
  • Zorrie was a 2021 National Book Award (Fiction) finalist.