Alec Wilkinson
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Alec Wilkinson (b. 1952 - ) is a writer, interviewer, essayist and master of the written word who has been a staff writer for The New Yorker since 1980. According to The Philadelphia Inquirer he among the "first rank of" contemporary American (20th Century and early 21st Century) "literary journalists...(reminiscent) of Naipaul, Norman Mailer and Agee." Aside from writing dozens of articles for The New Yorker, he is the author of over six books, including My Mentor; A Young Man's Friendship With William Maxwell(Houghton Mifflin, 2002), Moonshine Midnights, Big Sugar, The Riverkeeper, A Violent Act, and Mr. Apology & Other Essays. In his college days he was into creating rock and roll songs. He even worked for a year as a police officer with the Wellfleet Police department in Cape Cod, when he was in his twenties. Wilkinson is the recipient of a Lyndhurst Prize, a Robert F. Kennedy Book Award and a Guggenheim fellowship, and, besides his dedication to writing for The New Yorker, he contributes Esquire, Vogue and Rolling Stone magazine, among others. He is married, has a son, and lives in New York City. It was from his time spent in the company of his mentor, William Maxwell ( 1908 - 2000 ), one of the greats among 20th Century American writers that he fine-tuned his talent at writing.
