“Batuman's writing waltzes in a space in which books and life reflect each other.” —Los Angeles Times
Elif Batuman’s writing has been described as helplessly witty and concise – she is the author of three critically acclaimed books – The Possessed, The Idiot, and Either/Or. Her debut novel, The Idiot, was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction in 2018.
Elif graduated from Harvard College and has a PhD in comparative literature from Stanford University. During graduate school she studied in Uzbekistan, and from 2010 to 2013, she was a writer-in-residence at Koç University in Istanbul. Her collection, The Possessed: Adventures with Russian Books and the People Who Read Them, consists of comic interconnected non-fiction essays about the pursuit of Russian literature. It was a finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award, and the New York Times praises the book as, “hilarious, wide-ranging, erudite, and memorable, The Possessed is a sui generis feast for the mind and the fancy, ants and all.”
Either/Or, the much-anticipated sequel to Elif’s Pulitzer Prize-nominated book, The Idiot, was released in 2022 – of which the Washington Post writes, “‘Either/Or’ is a sequel that amplifies the meaning of its predecessor while expanding its philosophical ambit – in short, the best kind.”
Elif is the recipient of a Whiting Writers’ Award, a Rona Jaffe Foundation Writers’ Award, and a Paris Review Terry Southern Prize for Humor. She lives in Brooklyn, where she is a staff writer for the New Yorker.
Book
Elif Batuman
For Your Next Event
To get started, enter your name and email here. An agent will get back to you shortly to discuss the details.