Background
Peter Orner was born in 1968 in Chicago, Illinois, United States. He has an older brother and two younger siblings.
2007
Peter Orner signs books for fiction writer Donald Hays at the University of Arkansas during the 2007 Arkansas Festival of Writers.
2013
Peter Orner on KCRW 2013.
2019
Peter Orner with Joshua Bodwell and David R. Godine at a tribute to Andre Dubus at Dartmouth College in February 2019.
500 S State St, Ann Arbor, MI 48109, United States
The University of Michigan where Peter Orner received a Bachelor of Arts degree.
360 Huntington Ave, Boston, MA 02115, United States
Northeastern University where Peter Orner received a Doctor of Jurisprudence degree.
University of Iowa, Iowa City, Iowa 52242, United States
The University of Iowa where Peter Orner received a Master of Fine Arts degree.
Peter Orner
Peter Orner with Arthur Simms and Lucy Fradkin.
Peter Orner at Bemidji State University during Craft Talk.
Peter Orner at Mendocino Coast Writers Conference.
Peter Orner with Jean Pierre.
Peter Orner with Avram Kosasky.
Peter Orner
Peter Orner
Peter Orner at The New School at Commonweal.
Peter Orner with Josaphat Tjiho.
Peter Orner with novelist David Grossman at the Jewish Community Center of San Francisco.
(One of the most acclaimed and original story collections ...)
One of the most acclaimed and original story collections of the last decade, Peter Orner's first book explores the brief but far-reaching occasions that haunt us. The discovery of a murdered man in a bathrobe by the side of a road, the destruction of a town's historic City Hall building, and the recollection of a cruel wartime decision are equally affecting in Orner's vivid and intimate gaze. The first half of the book concerns the lives of unrelated strangers across the American landscape, and the second introduces two very different Jewish families, one on the East Coast, the other in the Midwest. Yet Orner's real territory is a memory, and this book of wide-ranging and innovative stories remains an important and unique contribution to the art of the American short story.
https://www.amazon.com/Esther-Stories-Peter-Orner/dp/0316224685/?tag=2022091-20
2001
(When Mavala Shikongo deserted them, the teachers at the b...)
When Mavala Shikongo deserted them, the teachers at the boys' school in Goas weren't surprised. How could they be? She was too beautiful, too powerful, and too mysterious for their tiny, remote, and arid world. They knew only one essential fact about their departed colleague: she was a combat veteran of Namibia's brutal war for independence. When Mavala returns to Goas with a baby son, all are awed by her boldness. The teachers try hard, once again, not to fall in love with her. They fail, immediately and miserably, especially the American volunteer, Larry Kaplanski.
https://www.amazon.com/Second-Coming-Mavala-Shikongo-Novel-ebook/dp/B000SF9W24/?tag=2022091-20
2006
(Alexander Popper can't stop remembering. Four years old w...)
Alexander Popper can't stop remembering. Four years old when his father tossed him into Lake Michigan, he was told, Sink or swim, kid. In his mind, he's still bobbing in that frigid water. The rest of this novel's vivid cast of characters also struggle to remain afloat: Popper's mother, stymied by an unhappy marriage, seeks solace in the relentless energy of Chicago; his brother, Leo, shadow boss of the family, retreats into books; paternal grandparents, Seymour and Bernice, once high fliers, now mourn for long lost days; his father, a lawyer and would-be politician obsessed with his own success, fails to see that the family is falling apart; and his college girlfriend, the fiercely independent Kat, wrestles with impossible choices. Covering four generations of the Popper family, Peter Orner illuminates the countless ways that love both makes us whole and completely unravels us. A comic and sorrowful tapestry of memory of connection and disconnection, Love and Shame and Love explores the universals with stunning originality and wisdom.
https://www.amazon.com/Love-Shame-Novel-Peter-Orner/dp/0316129380/?tag=2022091-20
2011
(Peter Orner zeroes in on the strange ways our memories de...)
Peter Orner zeroes in on the strange ways our memories define us: A woman's husband dies before their divorce is finalized; a man runs for governor of Illinois and loses much more than an election; two brothers play beneath the infamous bridge at Chappaquiddick. Employing the masterful compression for which he has been widely praised, Orner presents a kaleidoscope of individual lives viewed in startling, intimate close-up.
https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00A2DZIQ6/?tag=2022091-20
2013
(An elegy for an eccentric late father, and the end of a m...)
An elegy for an eccentric late father, and the end of a marriage, Am I Alone Here? is also a celebration of the possibility of renewal. At once personal and panoramic, this book will inspire readers to return to the essential stories of their own lives.
https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B01E2XN3ZE/?tag=2022091-20
2016
(In Maggie Brown & Others: Stories, Peter Orner chronicles...)
In Maggie Brown & Others: Stories, Peter Orner chronicles people whose lives are at inflection points. In forty-four compressed gems, he grips us with a series of defining moments. Whether it's a first date that turns into a late-night road trip to a séance in an abandoned airplane hangar or a family's memories of the painful mystery surrounding a forgotten uncle's demise, Orner reveals how our fleeting decisions between kindness and abandonment chase us across time. These stories are anchored by a poignant novella that delivers not only the joys and travails of a forty-year marriage but an entire era in a working-class New England city.
https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0316516112/?tag=2022091-20
2019
Peter Orner was born in 1968 in Chicago, Illinois, United States. He has an older brother and two younger siblings.
Peter Orner studied at the University of Michigan and received a Bachelor of Arts degree in 1990. He has also a Doctor of Jurisprudence degree from Northeastern University and a Master of Fine Arts degree from the University of Iowa.
Peter Orner is a Professor of English and Creative Writing at Dartmouth College. Previously he has also taught at the University of Iowa Writers' Workshop, The University of Montana, Washington University, Miami University, Bard College, and Charles University in Prague, Czech Republic. For many years he worked with graduate students as a professor at San Francisco State University and served as chair of the department. In 2017-2018, Peter was a Fulbright United States Scholar in Namibia where he taught at the University of Namibia. Peter also regularly teaches on the fiction faculty at the Warren Wilson MFA Program for Writers at Warren Wilson College.
Orner began his publishing career in 2001. Peter's fiction and non-fiction have appeared in the New York Times, the Atlantic Monthly, Granta, The Paris Review, McSweeney’s, The Southern Review, Ploughshares, and many other publications. Stories have been anthologized in Best American Stories. Peter is also the editor of three non-fiction books/oral histories for the Voice of Witness Series:Underground America: Narratives of Undocumented Lives (2008), Hope Deferred: Narratives of Zimbabwean Lives (2011) (co-edited with Annie Holmes), and Lavil: Life, Love, and Death in Port-au-Prince (2017) (co-edited with Evan Lyon).
Peter is the author of two novels: The second coming of Mavala Shikongo (2006) and Love and Shame and Love (2010), and two-story collections: Esther stories (2001, 2013 with a new foreword by Marilynne Robinson) and Last Car Over the Sagamore Bridge (2013). He also wrote a book, an essay collection, memoir Am I Alone Here? Notes on Living to Read and Reading to Live (2016) and Maggie Brown & Others: Stories (2019).
Peter also wrote introductions for the re-issue of Mavis Gallant's novels, A Fairly Good Time and Gina Berriault's story collection Women in Their Beds. A film of one of Peter's stories, "The Raft," (with a screenplay by Peter and Rob Jones) and starring Ed Asner premiered at the Woods Hole Film Festival in Woods Hole, Massachusetts in 2015, and has been screened at festivals around the country.
(Peter Orner zeroes in on the strange ways our memories de...)
2013(One of the most acclaimed and original story collections ...)
2001(An elegy for an eccentric late father, and the end of a m...)
2016(In Maggie Brown & Others: Stories, Peter Orner chronicles...)
2019(When Mavala Shikongo deserted them, the teachers at the b...)
2006(Alexander Popper can't stop remembering. Four years old w...)
2011
Quotations:
"I think that travel definitely forms my work, but ideally, for me, travel consists of living an ordinary day in a place and not as a traveler. I like to spend time in a place so I can go to the grocery store or the market and live day-to-day life."
"My message in creative writing classes is to use published works to inspire student writers to reach their own potential. I try to encourage young writers by showing them literature and showing them models that they can aspire to."
"Chicago does not go to the world, the world comes to Chicago! Who needs New York? Who has taller buildings than our tall buildings? Who's got a busier airport than our airport? You want Picasso? We got Picasso, big Picasso. Nobody can make heads or tails of it. It's a lion? No, a seahorse. Looks to me like a radiator with wings. Who gives a damn, people, a Picasso's a Picasso."
"But this is exactly why I read - and don't belong to a book group - because reading is the most individual thing there is. Why collectivize it? Didn't we have enough bad English teachers in school? Crowd sourcing and literature shouldn't mix."
"Actually, you’re not famous at all. Maybe you’ll get some traction after you’re dead?"
Peter is a former member of the Bolinas, California Volunteer Fire Department in Bolinas, California.
Peter Orner collects coffee cups and leaves half-drunk cups of coffee over the house.
He is a frequent but mediocre swimmer.
Quotes from others about the person
"Orner doesn't just bring his characters to life, he gives them souls."