Marie Arana

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Marie Arana
Arana at the 2019 Texas Book Festival
Arana at the 2019 Texas Book Festival
BornMarie Arana Campbell
Lima, Peru
OccupationAuthor (fiction and nonfiction), Critic
EducationNorthwestern University (BA)
University of Hong Kong (MA)
GenreAmerican literature
Notable worksAmerican Chica, Cellophane, Lima Nights, The Writing Life, Bolívar: American Liberator, Silver, Sword, and Stone: Three Crucibles in the Latin American Story.

Marie Arana (born Lima, Peru) is a Peruvian author, editor, journalist, critic, and the inaugural Literary Director of the Library of Congress.[1]

Personal Life

Marie Arana was born in

Harcourt Brace and Simon & Schuster
.

Career

For more than a decade she was the editor in chief of "Book World", the book review section of The Washington Post, during which time she instituted the partnership of The Washington Post with First Lady Laura Bush and the Librarian of Congress, James H. Billington, in hosting the annual National Book Festival on the Washington Mall. Arana claimed to be the only Hispanic division head of the newspaper at this time.[2] for many years, directed all programming for the National Book Festival among numerous other programs at the Library.[3] and most recently has been the Literary Director of the Library of Congress. Arana is a Writer at Large for The Washington Post. She is married to Jonathan Yardley, the Post's former chief book critic, and has two children from a previous marriage and two stepchildren.

Arana is the author of a memoir about a bicultural childhood American Chica: Two Worlds, One Childhood (finalist for the 2001

Simon Bolivar[4][5][6] It won the 2014 Los Angeles Times Book Prize for Biography.[7]
She has written introductions for many books, among them a National Geographic book of aerial photographs of South America, Through the Eyes of the Condor. and she is a frequent spokesperson on Hispanic issues, Latin America, and the book industry.

Arana is the Vice President of the 149-year-old Literary Society of Washington and a member of the Board of Trustees of PEN America. She is a member of the Advisory Board for SOUTHCOM, the U.S. Military Command for Central and South America. She has also served on the board of directors of the

National Geographic
, and numerous other literary publications throughout the Americas.

Arana was a Fellow at the Hoover Institution at Stanford University in 1996 and then again in 1999, an Invited Research Scholar at Brown University in 2008–2009. In October 2009, Arana received the Alumna Award of the Year at Northwestern University.[9]

In April 2009, Arana was named John W. Kluge Distinguished Scholar at the Library of Congress through 2010. In September 2009, she was elected to the Scholars' Council of the Library of Congress as well as the Board of Directors of the National Book Festival.

Arana was scriptwriter for the Latin American portion of the film "Girl Rising," which describes the life of Senna, a 14-year-old girl in the Andean gold-mining town of La Rinconada. At 17,000 feet above sea level, it is the highest human habitation in the world. The film was part of a campaign to promote the importance of girls' education. Arana's writing about that experience, which was published in The Best American Travel Writing 2013, was named one of "the most gripping and sobering" of the year.

In March 2015, Arana directed the Iberian Suite Festival Literary Series for the Kennedy Center. In the course of seven programs, she featured more than two dozen Spanish-language and Portuguese-language writers from around the world.

In October 2015, Arana was named Chair of the Cultures of the Countries of the South, an honorary post at the John W. Kluge Center of the Library of Congress. She then became Literary Advisor to the Librarian of Congress as well as director of the National Book Festival.

In 2019, Simon & Schuster published her latest book, Silver, Sword, and Stone: Three Crucibles in the Latin American Story (Orion Publishers released it in the United Kingdom). The Spanish edition of Bolívar: Libertador Americano was published the same year by Penguin Random House.

In October 2019, Carla Hayden, Librarian of Congress, named her Literary Director of the Library of Congress.

Bolivar and Silver, Sword and Stone have received accusations of hispanophobia, antiespañolismo, stereotyping, sectarianism and misinformation from those offended by Arana's stern criticism of Spain's colonial depredations of Latin America.[10][11][12]

In May 2020, Arana was awarded the 2020 Arts and Literature Award by the American Academy of Arts and Letters, which cited her accumulated work as “vivid and elegantly argued writing about Latin America . . . that shows us the dire effects of countries that have not ceased to be colonized for hundreds of years. Arana’s treatment of these sustained attacks is compelling and undeniable.”[13]

In March 2021, the Librarian of Congress Carla Hayden conferred on her the Library of Congress Award for Superior Service.

Arana's third book LatinoLand was published on February 20th, 2024.[14] The Washington Post wrote that, "Her fragmented and beautifully written narrative, which washes over readers in a series of portraits, rather than as one continuous story, is a perfect representation of Latino diversity".[2] The New York Times noted that the book had a very fast pace as it covered an expansive history.[15]

Awards and honors

  • Christopher Award for Excellence in Editing, 1986, Harcourt Brace Jovanovich
  • National Book Award Finalist, 2001, "American Chica"
  • Best Books of the Year, 2001, New York Times, Washington Post, Los Angeles Times, "American Chica"
  • Books for a Better Life Award, 2001, Best Memoir, "American Chica"
  • PEN/ Martha Albrand Award for Memoir, 2001 Finalist, American Chica"
  • Center for Fiction, John Sargent Award for First Fiction, 2006, "Cellophane"
  • Best Books of the Year, 2006, New York Times, Washington Post, Los Angeles Times, "Cellophane"
  • Northwestern University Alumna Award, 2009
  • El Comercio, Perú, Cinco Mejores Libros del Año, 2013, "Lima Nights"
  • Los Angeles Times Book Award, Best Biography, 2013, "Bolívar: American Liberator"
  • Washington Post Best Books of the Year, 2013, "Bolívar: American Liberator"
  • Top of the List, American Library Association, Best Nonfiction Book of the Year, 2019, "Silver, Sword, and Stone"
  • American Writers Museum, 2019 Friend of the Writer Award
  • Andrew Carnegie Medal of Excellence, Longlist 2020, "Silver, Sword, and Stone"
  • American Academy of Arts and Letters, Literature Award, 2020
  • Library of Congress Award for Superior Service, 2021

Honorary posts

  • National Book Critics Circle, Board of Directors, 1996–2000
  • National Association of Hispanic Journalists, Board of Directors, 1996–1999
  • Stanford University, Hoover Institution on War, Revolution, and Peace, senior fellow, 1996
  • Stanford University, Hoover Institution on War, Revolution, and Peace, visiting scholar, 2000
  • Brown University, John Carter Brown Library Visiting Scholar, 2009–2010
  • Virginia Quarterly Review, Board of Directors, 2011–
  • American Writers Museum, Board of Directors, 2016–
  • Kluge Scholars Circle, John W. Kluge Center, Library of Congress, 2010–2020
  • Kluge Chair in Countries and Cultures of the South, John W. Kluge Center, Library of Congress, 2017–2018
  • Library of Congress, Inaugural Literary Director, 2019–2021
  • Authors Guild, Board of Directors, 2020–
  • United States Southern Command, Dept. of Defense, Advisory Council, 2020–
  • PEN/Faulkner, Board of Directors, 2021–
  • PEN America, Board of Trustees, 2021–

Selected works

References

  1. ^ "Marie Arana". Library of Congress. Retrieved December 29, 2012.
  2. ^ a b "Review | Tracing the sprawling, complicated boundaries of 'LatinoLand'". Washington Post. March 7, 2024. Retrieved March 12, 2024.
  3. ^ "Marie Arana". The Washington Post. March 27, 2012. Retrieved March 31, 2012.
  4. ^ "Marie Arana Examines Two Americas". Rollins.edu. 2011-04-08. Retrieved 2012-03-31.
  5. ^ "Marie Arana". The Washington Post. 2012-03-27. Retrieved 2012-03-31.
  6. ^ Bolivar: American Liberator, reviewed by Joseph J. Ellis, The Washington Post, April 5, 2013
  7. LA Times
    . Retrieved April 14, 2014.
  8. ^ Arana, Marie (2012-09-14). "Marie Arana". VQR Online. Retrieved 2024-04-03.
  9. ^ Moore, Judy (October 21, 2009). "Marie Arana to Receive 2009 Northwestern Alumnae Award Oct. 22". Northwestern University. Retrieved 29 December 2012.
  10. ^ "Bolívar», el primer Tirano Banderas". 17 January 2020.
  11. TheGuardian.com
    . 24 August 2019.
  12. ^ "RC - Artículos - la "mirada" anglosajona sobre el mundo hispano".
  13. ^ "American Academy of Arts and Letters". Retrieved 2021-01-18.
  14. ^
    ISBN 9781982184896
    .
  15. ISSN 0362-4331
    . Retrieved 2024-03-12.
  16. Mercantile Library Center for Fiction
    , 2006
  17. ^ "Through the Eyes of the Condor by Robert B. Haas, Introduction by Marie Arana, Random House, 2007". Randomhouse.com. 2007-09-18. Retrieved 2012-03-31.
  18. ^ BOLIVAR | Kirkus Reviews.
  19. ^ SILVER, SWORD & STONE | Kirkus Reviews.
  20. ^ Cadava, Geraldo (2024-03-08). "Tracing the sprawling, complicated boundaries of 'LatinoLand'". Washington Post. Retrieved 2024-04-03.

External links

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