Michel Faber | |
|---|---|
 Michel Faber at HeadRead festival, Estonia, in 2019 | |
| Born | (1960-04-13)13 April 1960 (age 64) The Hague, Netherlands |
| Occupation | Novelist, poet, journalist |
| Citizenship | Naturalized British (since 1993)[citation needed] |
| Education | University of Melbourne |
| Period | 1998–present |
| Genre | Poetry, fiction |
| Notable works | The Crimson Petal and the White,Under the Skin,The Book of Strange New Things, LISTEN: On Music,Sound and Us |
| Partner | Louisa Young |
Michel Faber (born 13 April 1960) is a Dutch-born writer of English-language fiction, including his 2002 novelThe Crimson Petal and the White, andUnder the Skin (2000) which wasadapted for film byJonathan Glazer, starringScarlett Johansson. His novel for young adults,D: A Tale of Two Worlds, was published in 2020. His book,Listen: On Music, Sound and Us, a non-fiction work about music, came out in October 2023.
Faber was born inThe Hague, Netherlands. He and his parents emigrated to Australia in 1967. He attended primary and secondary school in the Melbourne suburbs ofBoronia andBayswater, then attended theUniversity of Melbourne, studying Dutch, Philosophy, Rhetoric, English Language (a course involving translation and criticism of Anglo-Saxon and Middle English texts) and English Literature. He graduated in 1980. He worked as a cleaner and at various other casual jobs, before training as a nurse atMarrickville and Western Suburbs hospitals in Sydney. He nursed until the mid-1990s. In 1993 he, his second wife and family emigrated to Scotland. Faber's second wife Eva died of cancer in July 2014 and he published a poetry collection,Undying, about this event in 2016. A biography of Faber by Rodge Glass,Michel Faber: The Writer and his Work, came out in 2023 (Liverpool University Press).
In Scotland, Faber is considered a Scottish author, or at least "Scottish by formation" (the term defining eligibility to enter the Macallan Short Story Competition, which Faber won in 1996).[1] Most of Faber's literary prizes, like theNeil Gunn Prize, theMacallan Prize and theSaltire First Book of the Year Award, were won in Scotland, he lived in Scotland, and his works are published by a Scottish-based publisher. In Australia, Faber is considered an Australian, because of his long residence there, because almost all of his schooling was completed there, and because some of his short stories are set in Australia.[2]
Faber wrote seriously from the age of fourteen, but did not submit his manuscripts for publication. Many of the short stories that appeared in his debut collection, as well as earlier drafts ofThe Crimson Petal and the White, were completed during the 1980s and stored away. Another novel completed in this period,A Photograph of Jesus, remains unissued. During the 1990s, with the encouragement of his wife, Eva, Faber began entering – and winning – short story competitions. This led to him being approached by the Edinburgh-based publishersCanongate Books, who have published his work in the UK ever since.
Faber's first published book was a collection of short stories,Some Rain Must Fall, issued in1998. Of these stories, the title piece had won the Ian St James Award in 1996, "Fish" had won the Macallan Prize in 1996, and "Half a Million Pounds and a Miracle" had won the Neil Gunn Award in 1997.
The first of Faber's novels to be published wasUnder the Skin (2000), written in, and inspired by, the Scottish Highlands. Like much of Faber's work, it defies easy categorisation, combining elements of the science fiction, horror and thriller genres, handled with sufficient depth and nuance to win almost unanimous praise from literary critics. It was translated into many languages (17 by 2004) and secured his reputation in Europe, as well as being shortlisted for theWhitbread First Novel Award.
Faber's second published novel wasThe Hundred and Ninety-Nine Steps (2001), set in Whitby. The original hardback edition included digitally manipulated colour photographs; these were absent from subsequent reissues. Radically different fromUnder The Skin in tone and theme,The Hundred and Ninety-Nine Steps attracted mixed reviews.
Faber's third published novel wasThe Courage Consort (2002), about ana cappella vocal group rehearsing a piece ofavant-garde music.
In 2002, Faber's 850-pageThe Crimson Petal and the White was published. Set in 1870s London and principally concerning a 19-year-old prostitute called Sugar, it was described by some critics aspostmodern while others echoed the assertion (made in an early review) that it was "the novel thatDickens might have written had he been allowed to speak freely".[3] Twenty years in the writing, the book showed Faber's admiration for Dickens' prose andGeorge Eliot's narrative architecture, but its themes were informed byfeminism, post-Freudian awareness of sexual pathology, and post-Marxian class analysis, as well as by unrestricted access to Victorian pornographic texts that had been suppressed until the late 20th century.The Crimson Petal and the White was a bestseller in the US, Italy, France, Holland and Belgium, and a steady seller in most other countries.
Faber's second collection of short storiesThe Fahrenheit Twins was published in 2005. Its opening story, "The Safehouse", won second place in the inaugural National Short Story Prize (since renamed the BBC National Short Story Award) in 2005.
The Crimson Petal and the White is by far his most popular work, but Faber chose never to write a sequel to his bestselling Victorian novel. However, he did write a number of short stories featuring characters fromThe Crimson Petal and the White, in scenarios that pre-dated or post-dated the events of the novel. While not a sequel (the novel's controversial ending was allowed to remain definitive and the fates of the heroines Sugar and Agnes were left undisclosed), the stories offered additional perspectives on some of the characters' past and future lives. Issued first in Italy, by Faber's long-term Italian publishers Einaudi, the stories were issued by Canongate in 2006, asThe Apple.
"Bye Bye Natalia", Faber's short story following his 2004 visit to Ukraine (see"Journalism" below), was eventually published in the July 2006 edition ofGranta and then chosen for inclusion in the 2008 edition ofTheO. Henry Prize Stories, an annual anthology dedicated to writers who are deemed to have made "a major contribution to the art of the short story".
Faber's novelThe Fire Gospel was published in 2008 as part of theCanongate Myth Series. Inspired by the myth ofPrometheus, it tells the story of a scholar of Aramaic called Theo, who steals an ancient 'gospel' describing the death of Jesus, from a bombed museum in Iraq. The book gently satirizes the publishing industry.
In 2009, he donated the short story "Walking After Midnight" to Oxfam's 'Ox-Tales' project, four collections of UK stories written by 38 authors. His story was published in theWater collection.[4]
Faber's sixth novel,The Book of Strange New Things, was published in 2014. The novel tells the story of a British missionary to an alien world. After its publication, Faber announced that he would retire from writing novels for adults. In an interview at Waterstones Trafalgar Square, Faber said "I think I have written the things I was put on earth to write. I think I've reached the limit".[5] In June 2015The Book of Strange New Things was named a Book of the Year by the magazineWorld.[6] In 2017,Amazon Video released the pilot of a TV adaptation, asOasis.
His novel for children,D: A Tale of Two Worlds, was published in 2020.
LISTEN: On Music, Sound and Us, a non-fiction quasi-anthropological work about music, tribalism, and human community was published by Canongate in October 2023.
In the years 2001 to 2004, Faber reviewed books for theScotland on Sunday newspaper. Throughout 2004, he wrote a regular feature for TheSunday Herald called "Image Conscious", analysing the layers of meaning, intent and association in various photographs. Since 2003, he has reviewed forThe Guardian, mainly choosing foreign fiction in translation, short story collections,graphic novels and books about music.
In 2004, as part of the Authors on the Frontline project, Faber travelled toUkraine withMédecins Sans Frontières, to witness MSF's intervention in theHIV/AIDS epidemic there.[7] Faber wrote an article forThe Sunday Times, published in January 2005.
In 2006, Faber contributed an essay, "Dreams in the Dumpster, Language Down the Drain", toNot One More Death (Verso/Stop The War Coalition), a collection of pieces examining US and UK involvement in the Iraq War.
In 2019, he contributed a piece toA Love Letter To Europe, an anthology of pieces expressing affection for Europe at the time of imminent Brexit.
A four-part television adaptation ofThe Crimson Petal and the White, produced by theBBC in 2011, starredRomola Garai,Chris O'Dowd,Richard E. Grant andGillian Anderson.[8]
The Courage Consort has been adapted for radio twice, by theBBC in the UK andABC Australia.[citation needed]
Under the Skin was adapted into a film, directed byJonathan Glazer and starringScarlett Johansson. It premièred at the Venice Film Festival on 3 September 2013.[9][10]
The Book of Strange New Things was adapted as ten 15-minute episodes forBBC Radio 4 in 2014,[11] and as a pilot for an Amazon Prime TV Series calledOasis.
Austlit, The Resource for Australian Literature, lists Michel Faber… so I feel safe in being able to include him.[permanent dead link].
