Siri Hustvedt – författare

One of the most anticipated books of 2026 for the Guardian, Observer and BBC Culture'A remarkable achievement'LOUISE KENNEDY'A deeply moving memoir, raw with loss, yet luminous with love'SARAH WATERS'What a kind, honest book. What a gift of love'DAVID MITCHELL'Essential reading from an all-time great'SARA COLLINSThe tender memoir of the forty-three years Siri Hustvedt spent with her husband, writer, poet and filmmaker Paul Auster - from their first encounter in 1980s New York to his death in 2024Ghost Stories is Siri Hustvedt's most personal work yet, a searing and intimate meditation on grief, memory and enduring love, written in the aftermath of the death of her husband, writer, poet and filmmaker Paul Auster.It is a patchwork-quilt book that stitches together memories from over forty years of love and life together: journal entries Siri wrote between November 2023 and 3 May 2024, the day of Paul's funeral; emails Siri sent to friends during his cancer treatment; notes Paul sent her over the course of their relationship; and three love letters Siri wrote to him in 1981, when he left her for a period of nine or ten days to return to his former life with his first wife and son.The book also contains Paul Auster's last ever piece of writing - the first thirty-five pages of what he hoped would be a small book of letters to Siri's and his grandson, Miles Auster Hustvedt Ostrander, born on 1 January 2024.Unflinching, tender and wise, this is the full-bodied story of Siri Hustvedt and Paul Auster's life together, an exploration of how grief unmoors time and how the intimacy of a shared life continues to mark the everyday.A note from Siri'I began writing Ghost Stories shortly after my husband, Paul Auster, died on April 30th 2024. My meditations on Paul's cancer, his death, my grief, the potent feeling I had of his presence on the day he was buried, and my memories from the years we spent together are interwoven with several texts that were written before he died: twelve letters I wrote to friends during his cancer treatment; journal entries I wrote between early November, 2023 and May 3, 2024; and three love letters I wrote to Paul in 1981, when he left me for a period of nine or ten days to return to his former life. Although I knew Paul had saved those letters, I hadn't read them since they were written and had only a foggy recollection of their content.In the last month of his life, Paul began writing what he hoped would be a small book of letters to our grandson, Miles Auster Hustvedt Ostrander, who was born on January 1st, 2024. Paul was too weak to finish it as planned, but the thirty-five pages he did manage to write are interwoven in this book.I want to stress that Paul's text is not an appendix to mine but an integral part of the book as a whole. Because the memoir turns on attachment, betweenness, and dialogue, all crucial to the love affair that lasted forty-three years, the insertion of one author's text into another's, is, in this case, essential to the memoir's overall meaning.'Praise for Siri Hustvedt'Hustvedt is that rare artist, a writer of high intelligence, profound sensuality and a less easily definable capacity for which the only word I can find is wisdom'Salman Rushdie'It is Hustvedt's gift to write with exemplary clarity of what is by necessity unclear'Hilary Mantel'She's a twenty-first-century Virginia Woolf, with many intellectual and creative rooms of her own'Literary Review

The tender memoir of the forty-three years Siri Hustvedt spent with her husband, writer, poet and filmmaker Paul Auster - from their first encounter in 1980s New York through the highs and lows of love, family and grief'The delight to be found in Hustvedt's book arises because so much of the landscape revealed is one of love. Love of life, love of the world, love of family... Ghost Stories will console you for the losses you have suffered, and for the ones you know - we all know - are yet to come'OBSERVER'A profound and forthright meditation on love and loss, unique in our literature'INDEPENDENT'Rich with accounts of their life together'SUNDAY TIMES'Distinctive and genuinely moving'NEW YORK TIMESGhost Stories is Siri Hustvedt's most personal work yet, a searing and intimate meditation on grief, memory and enduring love, written in the aftermath of the death of her husband, writer, poet and filmmaker Paul Auster.It is a patchwork-quilt book that stitches together memories from over forty years of love and life together: journal entries Siri wrote between November 2023 and 3 May 2024, the day of Paul's funeral; emails Siri sent to friends during his cancer treatment; notes Paul sent her over the course of their relationship; and three love letters Siri wrote to him in 1981, when he left her for a period of nine or ten days to return to his former life with his first wife and son.The book also contains Paul Auster's last ever piece of writing - the first thirty-five pages of what he hoped would be a small book of letters to Siri's and his grandson, Miles Auster Hustvedt Ostrander, born on 1 January 2024.Unflinching, tender and wise, this is the full-bodied story of Siri Hustvedt and Paul Auster's life together, an exploration of how grief unmoors time and how the intimacy of a shared life continues to mark the everyday. 'A remarkable achievement'LOUISE KENNEDY'A deeply moving memoir, raw with loss, yet luminous with love'SARAH WATERS'What a kind, honest book. What a gift of love'DAVID MITCHELL'Essential reading from an all-time great'SARA COLLINS A note from Siri'I began writing Ghost Stories shortly after my husband, Paul Auster, died on April 30th 2024. My meditations on Paul's cancer, his death, my grief, the potent feeling I had of his presence on the day he was buried, and my memories from the years we spent together are interwoven with several texts that were written before he died: twelve letters I wrote to friends during his cancer treatment; journal entries I wrote between early November, 2023 and May 3, 2024; and three love letters I wrote to Paul in 1981, when he left me for a period of nine or ten days to return to his former life. Although I knew Paul had saved those letters, I hadn't read them since they were written and had only a foggy recollection of their content. In the last month of his life, Paul began writing what he hoped would be a small book of letters to our grandson, Miles Auster Hustvedt Ostrander, who was born on January 1st, 2024. Paul was too weak to finish it as planned, but the thirty-five pages he did manage to write are interwoven in this book. I want to stress that Paul's text is not an appendix to mine but an integral part of the book as a whole. Because the memoir turns on attachment, betweenness, and dialogue, all crucial to the love affair that lasted forty-three years, the insertion of one author's text into another's, is, in this case, essential to the memoir's overall meaning.'Praise for Siri Hustvedt'Hustvedt is that rare artist, a writer of high intelligence, profound sensuality and a less easily definable capacity for which the only word I can find is wisdom'Salman Rushdie'It is Hustvedt's gift to write with exemplary clarity of what is by necessity unclear'Hilary Mantel'She's a twenty-first-century Virginia Woolf, with many intellectual and creative rooms of her own'Literary Review

'A great book'Elif Shafak, Observer'Phenomenal'GuardianIn this remarkable collection of essays, Siri Hustvedt confirms her reputation as one of our most important contemporary writers, bringing a feminist, interdisciplinary perspective to subjects across the humanities and sciences. The book's first section explores the complexities of perception and art, with Louise Bourgeois, Pablo Picasso, and Karl Ove Knausgaard among those who come under her scrutiny. In the book's central essay she explores the intractable mind-body problem, and in the final section she reflects on the mysteries of hysteria, synesthesia, and memory. With astounding clarity, passion, and wit, Hustvedt exposes gender bias, upends received ideas, and challenges her reader to think again.'A writer with an unusual blend of incisive intelligence, humour and imagination . . . we are fortunate to have Hustvedt voicing doubt so intelligently' Lara Feigel, Financial Times

FROM THE INTERNATIONALLY BESTSELLING AUTHOR OF WHAT I LOVED AND A WOMAN LOOKING AT MEN LOOKING AT WOMEN'A luminous collection of mind-expanding pieces on literary and philosophical themes' Observer'Thoughtful and sensuous'Daily TelegraphThis illuminating collection brings together Siri Hustvedt's earliest essays, exploring the themes that have preoccupied her writing throughout her career: memory and imagination, psychology and art, love and desire. Drawing on her personal experience - as daughter, sister, mother and wife; student, teacher, reader and writer - she illustrates fundamental aspects of our lives.Wise, honest and fiercely intelligent, this is a book that invites us to look afresh at ourselves and the world we inhabit.'One of the most talented voices in contemporary fiction . . . Hustvedt brings the same visual power, sensuality and intelligence to her collection of essays'Los Angeles Times

FROM THE INTERNATIONALLY BESTSELLING AUTHOR OF WHAT I LOVED'Funny, moving and erudite, playfully reminding us of a contemporary Jane Austen'Daily Mail'Astoundingly joyful'Guardian'Alarmingly funny'Times Literary SupplementAfter Mia's husband of thirty years asks for a 'pause', to indulge his infatuation with a young French colleague, she briefly breaks down before retreating to the prairie town of her childhood, to rage and reassess her life. Slowly, however, she's drawn into the lives of the women around her: her mother's circle of feisty widows, her young neighbour with two small children, the teenage girls in her poetry class. As Mia faces her summer without men, she must discover what's worth fighting for - and on whose terms. 'A rich and intelligent meditation on female identity'Sunday Times'A mordant comedy'Observer

LONGLISTED FOR THE BOOKER PRIZEWINNER OF THE LOS ANGELES TIMES FICTION PRIZE'Dazzling' Sunday Times'Truly wonderful' Daily MailArtist Harriet Burden, consumed by fury at the lack of recognition she has received from the New York art establishment, embarks on an experiment: she hides her identity behind three male fronts who exhibit her work as their own. Yet when Harriet unmasks herself to claim her rightful praise, not everyone believes her - submerging the art world in a scandal that soon turns deadly.'A novel that gloriously lives up to its title, one blazing with energy and thought' The Times'I have told nearly everyone I love - and some random acquaintances - to stop whatever they are doing and read The Blazing World'Financial Times

LONGLISTED FOR THE WOMEN'S PRIZE FOR FICTIONFROM THE INTERNATIONALLY BESTSELLING AUTHOR OF WHAT I LOVED 'A taut and convincing drama, as well as an intriguing metaphysical thriller' Sunday Times'Full of humour, surprise and powerful images' ObserverLily Dahl is a heroine of the old school: tough, beautiful and brave. A nineteen-year-old waitress and aspiring actress living in Webster, Minnesota, she becomes enchanted by an exotic outsider - an artist from New York. Drawn into a world of erotic adventure, she finds herself the target of mysterious acts of madness as she strains against the confines of small town life.'Queasily erotic, gothic and menacing' Evening StandardPRAISE FOR SIRI HUSTVEDT:'Hustvedt is that rare artist, a writer of high intelligence, profound sensuality and a less easily definable capacity for which the only word I can find is wisdom' Salman Rushdie'One of our finest novelists' Oliver Sacks'Reading a Hustvedt novel is like consuming the best of David Lynch' Financial Times'Few contemporary writers are as satisfying and stimulating to read as Siri Hustvedt' Washington Post

FROM THE INTERNATIONALLY BESTSELLING AUTHOR OF WHAT I LOVEDWITH A NEW INTRODUCTION BY CATHERINE LACEY'A work of dizzying intensity . . . an intriguing and sure-handed debut ' Don DeLillo'Brilliant . . . a dark, mesmerising debut' Independent on Sunday'Hustvedt has pulled off nothing less than a re-mapping of the modern feminist psyche' Daily TelegraphIris Vegan, a graduate student living alone and impoverished in New York, encounters four strong characters who fascinate and in different ways subordinate her: an inscrutable urban recluse who employs her to record the possessions of a murdered woman; a photographer whose eerie portrait of Iris takes on a life of its own; an old woman in hospital who tries to claim a remnant of the ailing Iris; and a professor she has an affair with. An exploration of female identity in an age when the old definitions - as some man's daughter/wife/mother - no longer apply, fuelled with eroticism and a sense of menace.'Attests to Hustvedt's thoroughly original style and her lucid contemporary voice . . . the announcement of a talented writer's arrival' Michiko Kakutani, New York TimesPRAISE FOR SIRI HUSTVEDT:'Hustvedt is that rare artist, a writer of high intelligence, profound sensuality and a less easily definable capacity for which the only word I can find is wisdom' Salman Rushdie'One of our finest novelists' Oliver Sacks'Reading a Hustvedt novel is like consuming the best of David Lynch' Financial Times'Few contemporary writers are as satisfying and stimulating to read as Siri Hustvedt' Washington Post

FROM THE INTERNATIONALLY BESTSELLING AUTHOR OF WHAT I LOVED AND A WOMAN LOOKING AT MEN LOOKING AT WOMEN'Lucid, absorbing and vigorous'Independent'Richly intelligent'Financial TimesIn these fascinating essays, Siri Hustvedt shows what lies behind her fiction: an abiding curiosity about who we are and how we got that way. Covering a wide range of subjects, from the nature of desire to false memories and the paintings of Goya, she draws on the insights provided by both the arts and sciences to deepen our understanding of what it means to be human - to live, think and look.'As an essayist, Hustvedt is the best kind: superbly clear, intellectually challenging but always human'Independent on Sunday

FROM THE INTERNATIONALLY BESTSELLING AUTHOR OF WHAT I LOVED'An astonishing family drama . . . almost certainly the best American novel you will read this year'Sunday Telegraph'Almost impossible to put down'Independent'Masterful'The Times'Wonderful'ObserverWhile clearing out their late father's papers, Erik and Inga Davidsen unearth a cryptic letter from his adolescence. Desperate to discover the man they never fully understood, they set about reading his memoir. As the siblings are drawn into his past, their lives are upended by two strangers. Erik becomes captivated by Miranda, a young mother who moves into his garden flat. And Inga, still grieving her husband's recent death, is threatened by a journalist in possession of a devastating secret. 'One of the most profound and absorbing books I've read in a long time'Washington Post

FROM THE INTERNATIONALLY BESTSELLING AUTHOR OF WHAT I LOVED AND A WOMAN LOOKING AT MEN LOOKING AT WOMENWITH A NEW INTRODUCTION BY NOGA ARIKHA'Provocative but often funny, encyclopedic but down to earth . . . an extraordinary double story' Oliver Sacks'It is Hustvedt's gift to write with exemplary clarity of what is by necessity unclear' Hilary Mantel, GuardianWhile speaking at a memorial event for her father, the novelist Siri Hustvedt suffered a violent seizure from the neck down. Was it triggered by nerves, emotion - or something else entirely?In this profoundly thought-provoking and revealing book, Hustvedt takes the reader on her journey through psychiatry, philosophy, neuroscience and medical history in search of a diagnosis. Conveying the often frightening mysteries of illness, she illuminates the perennially mysterious connection between mind and body and what we mean by 'I'.'Fascinating' Daily Telegraph'Elegant, clear and wide-ranging'Independent

FROM THE INTERNATIONALLY BESTSELLING AUTHOR OF WHAT I LOVED'Few contemporary writers are as satisfying and stimulating to read as Siri Hustvedt' Washington Post'A 21st-century Virginia Woolf' Literary ReviewA provocative, wildly funny, intellectually rigorous and engrossing novel, punctuated by Siri Hustvedt's own illustrations - a tour de force by one of America's most acclaimed and beloved writers.Fresh from Minnesota and hungry for all New York has to offer, twenty-three-year-old S.H. embarks on a year that proves both exhilarating and frightening - from bruising encounters with men to the increasingly ominous monologues of the woman next door.Forty years on, those pivotal months come back to vibrant life when S.H. discovers the notebook in which she recorded her adventures alongside drafts of a novel. Measuring what she remembers against what she wrote, she regards her younger self with curiosity and often amusement. Anger too, for how much has really changed in a world where the female presidential candidate is called an abomination?'Provocative and mysterious . . . comic and sensual' Daily MailPRAISE FOR SIRI HUSTVEDT:'Hustvedt is that rare artist, a writer of high intelligence, profound sensuality and a less easily definable capacity for which the only word I can find is wisdom' Salman Rushdie'One of our finest novelists' Oliver Sacks'Reading a Hustvedt novel is like consuming the best of David Lynch' Financial Times

'Dizzyingly flexible, deeply human, often funny, it blasts aside our preconceptions and urges us to see the world as it is' iFeminist philosophy meets family memoir in Siri Hustvedt's most personal essay collection yet, a scintillating and profound exploration of motherhood, the maternal and misogyny. Ranging across artistic mothers such as Jane Austen and Louise Bourgeois, psychoanalysis, science, literature and ethnography, this is a polymath's journey into urgent questions about familial love and hate, human prejudice and cruelty, and the transformative power of art. Fierce, moving and witty, it warns against drawing hard and fast borders where none exist.'The voice is consistent, combining assured erudition with more playful questioning, always thoughtful and capable of surprising shifts of register and even genre' Lara Feigel, GuardianPRAISE FOR SIRI HUSTVEDT:'Hustvedt is that rare artist, a writer of high intelligence, profound sensuality and a less easily definable capacity for which the only word I can find is wisdom' Salman Rushdie'It is Hustvedt's gift to write with exemplary clarity of what is by necessity unclear' Hilary Mantel'Her novels have received a deserved acclaim. But to my mind, she is even more to be admired as an essayist . . . in this regard I feel that she resembles Virginia Woolf ' Observer'Few contemporary writers are as satisfying and stimulating to read as Siri Hustvedt' Washington Post

Hip Hop Womanist writer and theologian EbonyJanice's book of essays centre a fourth wave of Womanism, dreaming, the pursuit of softness, ancestral reverence, and radical wholeness as tools of liberation.  ALL THE BLACK GIRLS ARE ACTIVISTS is a love letter to Black girls and Black women, asking and attempting to offer some answers to “Who would black women get to be if we did not have to create from a place of resistance?” by naming Black women's wellness, wholeness, and survival as the radical revolution we have been waiting for.