Love of My Youth (Gordon)

Author Bio 
• Aka—Mary Gilmour
• Birth—December 8, 1949
• Where—New York, New York, USA
• Education—B.A., Barnard College; M.A., Syracuse
   University
• Awards—Guggenheim Fellowship; O. Henry Award;
   Janet Heidegger kafka Award
• Currently—lives in New York, New York

Mary Gordon is the author of the novels Spending, The Company of Women, and The Rest of Life, as well as the memoir The Shadow Man. She has received a Lila Wallace-Reader's Digest Writer's Award, a Guggenheim Fellowship, and the 1997 O. Henry Award for best short story. She teaches at Barnard College and lives in New York City. (From the publisher.)

Extras
From a 2004 Barnes & Noble interview:

• I don't have any great first job tales: I ve never worked on a tramp steamer or in a coal mine or anything like that. I think the inspiration for my writing came largely from my father and the joy that life in books represented to me."

• I love dancing; I adore salsa dancing and wish I could be in a Broadway chorus."

• I could not write without my dog, Rhoda, a Lab-chow mix."

• I would trade any writerly success if it would mean my children would be happy."

• I hate George Bush, John Ashcroft, Rumsfeld, and Cheney. I hate bullies. I hate people who say, It's so fun,' and say, 'literally,' when they mean, figuratively.' "

• When asked what book most influenced her life or career as a writer, here is what she said:

Mrs. Dalloway by Virginia Woolf. When I read it, I thought of myself as a poet. It made me aware that I could write prose that had the lyric power of poetry, and that I could explore the inner life of a woman with a depth and expansiveness I had never imagined. 

 (Author interview from Barnes & Noble.)