Talk page
Title:
A Conversation with Pia de Jong
Speaker:
Abstract:
This special Friends Event will feature the novelist and
columnist Pia de Jong, who will be reading from her most recent
work and discussing her life as a writer in the United States.
Since moving to Princeton with her family in 2012, Pia de Jong
has written a popular weekly column for the leading Amsterdam
daily newspaper, NRC Handelsblad, about her life in the U.S.
In the literary tradition of European writers visiting America
that includes Alexis de Tocqueville, Isabella Bird, and Alistair
Cooke, Pia writes with warmth and insight about the people she
encounters and the lessons she has learned. This past summer,
the Dutch publisher Prometheus issued a compilation of more
than 100 of her columns under the title Flessenpost (Notes in a
Bottle). Now, a selection of her columns, translated into
English, has also been published, along with selections from
her fiction work and other articles.
Pia made the literary debut of the year in 2008 with her first
novel, Lange dagen (Long days), which won the Flemish
Golden Owl readers award and was shortlisted for several other
prizes. It was translated into Italian as Verso Nord in 2009. Her
second novel, Dieptevrees (Fear of depth), was published in
2010 to widespread acclaim. She has published two books for
children and has won many awards for her short stories. From
2010 to 2012, she wrote a weekly column for the Dutch
Financial Times.
Copies of Pia’s publications, in both Dutch and English, will
be available at the talk. Landon Jones, Friend of the Institute
and former Managing Editor of People, will moderate the
conversation with Pia, who will read from her work.
Link: