The GC’s Leon Levy Center for Biography announced the recipients of four resident fellowships, supported by the Leon Levy Foundation, for the upcoming academic year.
 
Each recipient of the prestigious award receives a $65,000 grant, writing space, and full access to research facilities. Fellows also participate in monthly seminars and the center’s public events, including its annual lecture and conference, and are encouraged to join the GC’s intellectual community. 
 
The four fellows for 2017-2018 are: 

  • Justin Gifford [pictured], for a biography of Eldridge Cleaver (1935-1998), the controversial Black Power figure from the 1960s. Gifford, a professor of African American Literature at the University of Nevada, will base his biography on more than 30,000 documents. His book will be published by Lawrence Hill Books, an imprint of the Chicago Review Press.
  • Lindsay Whalen, for a biography of Mary Oliver, identified by Dwight Garner in the New York Times as “far and away, the country’s bestselling poet.” Her biography is already under contract to Penguin Press.
  • Eleanor R. Randolph, for a biography of Michael Bloomberg, the business tycoon and mayor of New York City from 2001-2013. Randolph is a veteran New York Times reporter and editor. As a member of the Times editorial board from 1998-2016, Randolph wrote about Bloomberg’s years in City Hall. Randolph’s biography is under contract with Simon & Schuster.
  • Bruce Jay Weber, for a biography of E.L. Doctorow, the celebrated American novelist (1931-2015). Weber, a former New York Times arts correspondent and obituary writer, first met Doctorow in 1985. His biography is under contract with Scribner.

Past fellows who have published books supported in part by their fellowships include Ruth Franklin (Shirley Jackson: A Rather Haunted Life), D.T. Max (Every Love Story Is a Ghost Story: A Life of David Foster Wallace), and James Davis (Eric Walrond: A Life in the Harlem Renaissance and the Transatlantic Caribbean).
 
The Leon Levy Center also announced one Dissertation Fellowship of $22,000, awarded to Micki Kaufman (History) for her dissertation on the work of Henry Kissinger. Kaufman’s thesis is “Everything on Paper Will Be Used Against Me: Quantifying Henry Kissinger.”