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Clifford Chase

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American novelist
Clifford Chase
Chase in 2007Chase in 2007
Born1958 (age 65–66)
Connecticut, U.S.
OccupationAuthor
Alma materUniversity of California, Santa Cruz
City College of New York

Clifford Chase (born 1958) is an American author who has written the memoir The Tooth Fairy and Winkie, a novel about a sentient teddy bear accused of terrorism. He has also written additional memoirs and edited Queer 13: Lesbian and Gay Writers Recall Seventh Grade, a shortlisted nominee in the Children's/Young Adult and Nonfiction Anthologies categories at the 1999 Lambda Literary Awards.

Life

Chase was born in 1958 in Connecticut as the youngest of five brothers and sisters. All of his other siblings were much older than him except for his brother Ken, who was only six years older. Chase had a close relationship with Ken, who like him was also gay, and Chase was deeply affected when his brother died of AIDs at the age of 37.

Chase's family moved when he was young to San Jose, California, where he grew up. He earned his undergraduate degree from the University of California at Santa Cruz in 1980 and received a graduate degree in creative writing from the City College of New York in 1987. In the 1980s he worked in public relations at Newsweek.

Chase currently lives in Brooklyn. He's worked as a visiting writer at Bowling Green State University, where he instructed courses in creative writing for the English Department, and as a visiting writer and professor of English at Wesleyan University.

Writing career

Chase's memoir On the Shoulder of the Road, about his brother Ken and the rest of his family, was published in 1994. The following year he released The Hurry-Up Song: A Memoir of Losing My Brother, which The Harvard Gay & Lesbian Review called "an honest assessment of the gruesome realities of coming to terms with the premature death of a brother."

Chase's first novel, Winkie, was released in 2006 and is a satirical tale of a sentient teddy bear accused of terrorism. The novel was named a must-read selection by Entertainment Weekly, a notable book by The New York Times, and was a finalist for a Borders Original Voices Award. The novel has since been translated into nearly a dozen languages and in 2011 was adapted into a play at 59E59 Theaters by the Godlight Theater Company.

In 2014, Chase released his book The Tooth Fairy: Parents, Lovers, and Other Wayward Deities, which Publishers Weekly called "a memoir for the Twitter age."

Critical reception

In a starred review, Publishers Weekly said Chase's satirical novel Winkie "is way too odd to be sentimental, and its political sensibility shuttles easily between the cartoonish and the shrewd. Chase puts himself in the same league as David Sedaris with this unclassifiable debut. Literary agent Donald Maass has held Winkie up as a prime example of political satire for new writers, stating that "the humor isn't in the teddy bear itself. Hilarity springs from the bear's too-real situation."

References

  1. Chase, Clifford (2006). Winkie (1. ed.). New York, NY: Grove Press. ISBN 0802118305.
  2. Chase, Clifford (2014). Front cover image for The tooth fairy : parents, lovers, and other wayward deities (a memoir) The tooth fairy : parents, lovers, and other wayward deities (a memoir). Harry N. Abrams. ISBN 9781468306958.
  3. "Queer 13 : lesbian and gay writers recall seventh grade | WorldCat.org". search.worldcat.org. Retrieved 20 November 2023.
  4. ^ The Bedford Reader, Fifth Edition, edited by X. J. Kennedy, Dorothy M. Kennedy, and Jane E. Aaron, Bedford Books of St. Martin's Press, 1994, page 549.
  5. A Member of the Family: Gay Men Write about Their Families edited by John Preston, Dutton, 1992, pages 155-156.
  6. ^ "Brother & Brother: Review" by Edouad Fontenot, Harvard Gay & Lesbian Review. Spring 1995, volume 2, issue 2, page 44.
  7. Growing Up Gay/Growing Up Lesbian: A Literary Anthology by Bennett L. Singer, W.W. Norton, 1994, page 150.
  8. "Clifford Chase". Amherst County Public Library. Retrieved 20 November 2023.
  9. "Clifford Chase". catalog.library.tamu.edu. Texas A&M University Libraries. Retrieved 20 November 2023.
  10. "THE HURRY-UP SONG | Kirkus Reviews". Retrieved 20 November 2023.
  11. ^ Heavy Rotation: Twenty Writers on the Albums that Changed Their Lives edited by Peter Terzian, Harper Perennial 2009, page 291.
  12. "Clifford Chase’s Winkie, a Bear in Trouble, at 59E59 - Review" by David Rooney, The New York Times, March 14, 2011.
  13. The Tooth Fairy: Parents, Lovers, and Other Wayward Deities (A Memoir)," Publishers Weekly, 03/10/2014.
  14. "Winkie," Publishers Weekly, 03/06/2006.
  15. The Fire in Fiction: Passion, Purpose, and Techniques to Make Your Novel Great by Donald Maass, Writer's Digest Books, pages 176-177.

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