Carter, Emily 1960-

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Carter, Emily 1960-

(Emily Roiphe Carter)

PERSONAL: Born 1960, in New York, NY; daughter of Anne Roiphe (a novelist); stepdaughter of Herman Roiphe (a psychotherapist); married second husband, Johnnie Sage Ammentorp, 1999. Education: Attended New York University.

ADDRESSES: Home—Minneapolis, MN.

CAREER: Worked for Minneapolis Star Tribune, Minneapolis, MN; teacher and writer.

AWARDS, HONORS: Loft/McKnight Award; National Magazine Award; Whiting Writers’ Award; Bush Foundation award.

WRITINGS:

Glory Goes and Gets Some (short stories), Coffee House Press (Minneapolis, MN), 2000.

Work anthologized in Best American Short Stories 1998, edited by Garrison Keillor. Columnist for Speakeasy, magazine of Loft Literary Center, Minneapolis, MN. Contributor to periodicals, including Story, Gathering of the Tribes, Between C & D, Artforum, Open City, Great River Review, and Poz.

SIDELIGHTS: Emily Carter grew up in the neighborhood of Park Avenue in New York City, and her teenage years were not typical. She is the daughter of Anne Roiphe, novelist and feminist thinker; her stepfather, Herman Roiphe, is a well-known psychotherapist. Though she came from a background in which intellectual pursuits were encouraged, Carter did poorly in school and began drinking alcohol at the age of thirteen. She later moved on to other drugs, including heroin and cocaine, and dropped out of New York University after only one semester. For a time she worked on and off as a topless dancer to support her drug habit. At the same time, however, she was writing poetry and fiction and giving readings at literary clubs around Greenwich Village. Carter eventually revealed her drug addiction to her parents, and was sent for treatment to the Hazelden Clinic in Minnesota. Carter was able to beat her drug habit but discovered that years of drug abuse had left her with several health problems. She is HIV-positive.

Though Carter’s first book, Glory Goes and Gets Some, is fiction, it bears much similarity to the author’s own experiences. The collection of twenty-one short stories, some of which were originally published in the New Yorker, is linked by the main character, Gloria Bronski, a drug addict and an alcoholic who leaves New York City for a recovery community in Minnesota. Gloria is also HIV-positive and depressed. In these stories Gloria tells of her life and her road to recovery. A reviewer in Kirkus Reviews commented: “Carter’s eye for detail and ear for the rhetoric of recovery, her feel for people trying to make sense of their lives, turn what could be amusing glosses into moving portraits.” A Publishers Weekly contributor described the book as evidence of a “brave new talent” distinguished by an “intense, edgy, boldly candid and irrepressibly sardonic voice.”The title story from the collection was included in Best American Short Stories 1998.