Wayne Koestenbaum
April 24–25, 2023
Bio
Born and raised in San Jose, California, Wayne Koestenbaum is a poet, critic, novelist, artist, and performer, having published nineteen books, including The Queen’s Throat, which was a national Book Critics Circle Award finalist. Praised by many for his work’s blend of risk and joy, Susan Sontag called The Queen’s Throat a “brilliant book.” His other books include Camp Marmalade, The Pink Trance Notebooks, My 1980s & Other Essays, Andy Warhol: A Biography, and Jackie Under My Skin: Interpreting an Icon. After receiving his B.A. from Harvard University, he received an M.A. from The Johns Hopkins Writing Seminars, and a Ph.D. from Princeton University. His poems and essays have been widely published in anthologies, including The Believer, The Iowa Review, Artforum, and The New Yorker. In 2017, his first piano/vocal record, Lounge Act, was released by Ugly Duckling Presse records. In 2020, Koestenbaum won the American Academy of Arts and Letters Award. Previously an Associate Professor of English at Yale, he is now a Distinguished Professor of English, French, and Comparative Literature at the CUNY Graduate Center in New York City.