Walter Abish facts for kids

Walter Abish (born December 24, 1931 – died May 28, 2022) was an American writer. He was born in Austria. He wrote many unique novels and short stories. Walter Abish won the PEN/Faulkner Award for Fiction in 1981. He also received a special award called a MacArthur Fellowship six years later.

Early life

Walter Abish was born in Vienna, Austria, on December 24, 1931. His family was Jewish. His father, Adolph, made perfumes. His mother was Friedl (Rubin).

When he was young, his family had to leave their home because of the Nazis. They first went to Italy and then to Nice. From 1940 to 1949, they lived in Shanghai, China.

In 1949, his family moved to Israel. Walter Abish joined the army there. This is where he became interested in writing. In 1957, he moved to the United States. He became an American citizen three years later.

Career

Walter Abish published his first novel, Alphabetical Africa, in 1974. This book was very special. In its first and last chapters, every word started with the letter "A". People thought it was a clever trick, but also more than that.

A year later, he released his first collection of short stories called Minds Meet. One story imagined a famous writer, Marcel Proust, living in Albuquerque. His second story collection, In the Future Perfect, came out in 1977. In these stories, he used words in unusual ways, almost like puzzles.

In 1979, Walter Abish received a writing award from the National Endowment for the Arts. His second novel, How German Is It, was published in 1980. This book became his most famous work. It won him the PEN/Faulkner Award for Fiction in 1981.

He also received other important awards. These included a Guggenheim Fellowship in 1981 and a MacArthur Fellowship in 1987. He also helped with a literary magazine called Conjunctions. His third collection of stories, 99: the New Meaning, came out in 1990. His last novel, Eclipse Fever, was published in 1993.

Walter Abish also taught at many universities. Some of these were Columbia University, Brown University, and Yale University. He also helped lead International PEN, an organization for writers. In 1998, he was chosen as a Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences.

Personal life

Walter Abish married Cecile Gelb in 1953. Cecile is a photographer and a sculptor. They were married until Walter passed away. They did not have any children.

Walter Abish died on May 28, 2022. He was 90 years old. He passed away in Manhattan, New York.

Awards

• 1972 – Fellow of New Jersey State Council on the Arts
• 1974 – Rose Isabel Williams Foundation grant
• 1977 – Ingram Merrill Foundation grant
• 1979 – Fellow of National Endowment for the Arts
• 1981 – Guggenheim fellowship
• 1981 – CAPS grant
• 1981 – PEN/Faulkner Award for Fiction
• 1985 – Fellow of National Endowment for the Arts How German Is It
• 1987 – Fellow of German Academic Exchange Service
• 1987 – MacArthur Fellows Program
• 1991 – American Academy and Institute of Arts and Letters Award of Merit Medal for the Novel
• 1992 – Lila Wallace – Reader's Digest Fund fellowship

See also

In Spanish: Walter Abish para niños