Frank Bruni | |
|---|---|
| Born | Frank Anthony Bruni (1964-10-31)October 31, 1964 (age 60) White Plains,New York, U.S. |
| Education | University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill (BA) Columbia University (MS) |
| Occupation(s) | Op-ed columnist,The New York Times; former chief restaurant critic |
| Notable credit | The New York Times |
Frank Anthony Bruni (born October 31, 1964) is an American journalist writing forThe New York Times since 1995. Following a wide range of assignments, including a stint as chief restaurant critic, he was named anop-ed columnist in June 2011. Bruni joinedDuke University in June 2021 as Professor of the Practice of Journalism and Public Policy in theSanford School of Public Policy.[1][2] Since joining Duke, he continues writing aTimes newsletter and remains a contributing opinion writer for the newspaper. Bruni will receive theNorth Carolina Award, the highest civilian honor in the state, from governorRoy Cooper.
Bruni is the author of five bestselling books:The Age of Grievance, about indiscriminate pique and political dysfunction in contemporary America;The Beauty of Dusk, about his imperiled eyesight and what his medical odyssey taught him;Born Round, a memoir about his family's love of food and his own struggles with overeating;Where You Go Is Not Who You'll Be, about the college admissions mania;[3] andAmbling Into History, aboutGeorge W. Bush.
Bruni was educated at theLoomis Chaffee School,[4] an independent boarding and daycollege preparatory school inWindsor,Connecticut, followed by theUniversity of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, from which he graduatedPhi Beta Kappa in 1986 with a B.A. in English. He was aMorehead Scholar and wrote for the student paper,The Daily Tar Heel.[5] He then attendedColumbia University'sGraduate School of Journalism, from which he graduated second in his class with a master of science degree in journalism, and also won aPulitzer Traveling Fellowship.
After graduating from Columbia, Bruni joined the staff of theNew York Post and then moved on to theDetroit Free Press, where he did a wide range of beats, including a stint covering thePersian Gulf War. He spent more than a year as the movie critic and also wrote extensively aboutLGBT issues andAIDS. In 1992,[6] he was a runner-up for thePulitzer Prize infeature writing for his profile of a convictedchild molester. In 1995, Bruni took a job withThe New York Times as a metropolitan reporter and often wrote for theTimes' Sunday magazine and for Sunday Arts & Leisure.
In 1998, he was assigned to theWashington, D.C. bureau, where he coveredCapitol Hill andCongress, before being sent on thecampaign trail to follow then-Texas GovernorGeorge W. Bush. He then covered theWhite House for the first eight months of the Bush administration and served as the Washington-based staff writer for the Sunday magazine. In July 2002, he was promoted toRome bureau chief. Two years later, he became theTimes' restaurant critic. After more than five years in that position, he returned briefly to the magazine before becoming an op-ed columnist. In the spring of 2014, he taught a journalism seminar atPrinceton University.[7] In 2016, the National Lesbian and Gay Journalists Association gave him its Randy Shilts Award for his career-long contribution toLGBT Americans. He was previously awarded theGLAADMedia Award for Outstanding Newspaper Columnist in 2012 and 2013.[8]
Bruni's bookAmbling into History chronicles his time covering Bush's campaign.Born Round[9] deals in part with his time as theTimes' restaurant critic and was named one of the best nonfiction books of 2009 byThe New York Times,Publishers Weekly,The Washington PostandAmazon.com. In theTimes' Sunday Book Review, Dominique Browning raved that "the love with which Bruni writes about his family is breathtaking."Publishers Weekly deemedBorn Round a "powerful, honest book about desire, shame, identity and self-image."
Where You Go Is Not Who You'll Be was published byGrand Central Publishing, an imprint of theHachette Book Group, in March 2015 and was reissued in an expanded, updated paperback a year later. In a review of it inThe Washington Post,[10]Wesleyan University President Michael Roth called it "a humane, measured book" with "lessons for a very wide audience indeed." In February 2017, Bruni released his first cookbook, written with hisTimes colleagueJennifer Steinhauer titledA Meatloaf in Every Oven. It includes recipes from such prominent chefs asBobby Flay andApril Bloomfield.
Bruni has also done extensive reporting on religion and is the author, with Elinor Burkett, ofA Gospel of Shame: Children, Sexual Abuse and the Catholic Church. His freelance work has appeared in several magazines, includingConde Nast Traveler. Although he formalized a relationship with CNN in September 2017 and appears on its shows as a commentator about four times a week, he also appears occasionally onReal Time with Bill Maher, and has been a guest on late-night talk shows as well. He once served as a guest judge onTop Chef and appeared briefly in the movieJulie & Julia, which was written and directed by his friendNora Ephron.
In February 2018, he published a long and unusually personal column for theTimes about an affliction that, overnight, robbed him of functional vision in his right eye. He described the difficult adjustment to that and what it's like to live with the fear of his left eye being affected, too. His memoir,The Beauty of Dusk, published bySimon & Schuster, reflects further on the experience and discusses aging and physical limitations amongBaby Boomers who once thought themselves invincible.[11]
Bruni's last regularly scheduled opinion column forThe New York Times appeared on June 17, 2021.[12] and he was awarded the Thomas Wolfe Prize.[13]
Bruni is openlygay.[14] He has struggled witheating disorders, includingbulimia.[5][15] Bruni relocated fromNew York City'sUpper West Side neighborhood toNorth Carolina in 2021.[16]
