Susan Sontag

American writer and filmmaker, professor, and activist (1933-2004) · United States · Writers · Died at 71

Susan Sontag is read about 1,685 times a day, in 69 languages.

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She turned cultural criticism into an intellectual sport - sharp, unsparing essays that made people rethink what art meant and how suffering gets packaged for public consumption. Sontag wrote like someone who'd read everything and refused to pretend comfort where none existed.

Writers Writer / Author Literature Television Screenwriting Fiction Philosophy Journalism

A life in dates

2004Died28 December 20042003Peace Prize of the German Publishers' and Booksellers' AssociationAwardPrincess of Asturias Literary PrizeAward2001Jerusalem PrizeAward2000National Book AwardAwardNational Book Award for FictionAward1978“There is a peculiarly modern predilection for psychological explanations of disease, as of everything else.”In their wordsIllness As Metaphor (1978), ch. 7 (pp. 55-56)Read the whole statement

1977“A curious word, wanderlust. I'm ready to go. I've already gone. Regretfully, exultantly. A prouder lyricism. It's not Paradise that's lost. Advice.”In their words31 October 1977"Unguided Tour", in The New Yorker (31 October 1977), final lines; also in I, Etcetera (1977)Read the whole statement

National Book Critics Circle Award in CriticismAward1975“Painters and sculptors under the Nazis often depicted the nude, but they were forbidden to show any bodily imperfections.”In their words6 February 1975Fascism" (1974), published in The New York Review of Books (6 February 1975) and reprinted in Sontag's Under the Sign of Saturn (1980), p.Read the whole statement

“In contrast to the asexual chasteness of official communist art, Nazi art is both prurient and idealizing.”In their words6 February 1975"Fascinating Fascism" (1974), published in The New York Review of Books (6 February 1975) and reprinted in Sontag's Under the Sign ofRead the whole statement

Guggenheim FellowshipAward1966Guggenheim FellowshipAward1965George Polk AwardAward1963“Ours is an age which consciously pursues health, and yet only believes in the reality of sickness. The truths we respect are those born of affliction.”In their words1 February 1963Review of Selected Essays by Simone Weil, The New York Review of Books (1 February 1963)Read the whole statement

“The truth is always something that is told, not something that is known. If there were no speaking or writing, there would be no truth about anything. There would only be what is.”In their wordsThe Benefactor (1963), Ch. 1, p. 1, Farrar, Straus and GirouxRead the whole statement

1933Born16 January 1933

Also in Deutsch

Photos 8

Susan Sontag 1979 ©Lynn Gilbert (headshot)

Against Interpretation (1966 1st ed dust jacket cover)

Borges y susan sontag en feria del libro

I haven't been everywhere but it's on my list. (14881562212)

RIT yearbook 1978 page 75

RIT yearbook 1978 page 95

Styles of Radical Will (1969 1st ed dust jacket)

Sub turri - Under the tower - the yearbook of Boston College (1980) (14765982495)

In their own words 10

Susan Sontag

10 statements, newest first

Illness is the night-side of life, a more onerous citizenship. Everyone who is born holds dual citizenship, in the kingdom of the well and in the kingdom of the sick.
1978, Illness As Metaphor (1978), foreword, p. 3, Farrar, Straus and Giroux, Own words
There is a peculiarly modern predilection for psychological explanations of disease, as of everything else.
1978, Illness As Metaphor (1978), ch. 7 (pp. 55-56), Own words
A curious word, wanderlust. I'm ready to go. I've already gone. Regretfully, exultantly. A prouder lyricism. It's not Paradise that's lost. Advice.
Oct 31, 1977, "Unguided Tour", in The New Yorker (31 October 1977), final lines; also in I, Etcetera (1977), Own words

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Awards

Princess of Asturias Literary Prize2003

Peace Prize of the German Publishers' and Booksellers' Association2003

Jerusalem Prize2001

National Book Award2000

National Book Award for Fiction2000

National Book Critics Circle Award in Criticism1977

Guggenheim Fellowship1975

Guggenheim Fellowship1966

George Polk Award1965

Harvard Centennial Medal

Commandeur des Arts et des Lettres

MacArthur Fellows Program

Family

Susan Sontag

Partners

Spouse Philip Rieff

Child David Rieff

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About this person

Susan Lee Sontag published her first major work, "Notes on 'Camp'", in 1964, and it announced a voice that wouldn't soften. Against Interpretation followed in 1966, then On Photography in 1977 - books that dismantled how people looked at images and meaning. She wrote Illness as Metaphor in 1978, stripping away the narrative decorations around disease. She traveled to conflict zones during the Vietnam War and the Siege of Sarajevo, turning observation into argument. Her essays and speeches on literature, cinema, war, and left-wing politics drew backlash, but she kept the line taut. She published novels later - The Volcano Lover in 1992, In America in 1999 - and the short story "The Way We Live Now" in 1986, then closed with Regarding the Pain of Others in 2003. She died December 28, 2004, called one of the most influential critics of her generation.

Country

United States

In common with Susan

Mia FarrowAlso in Zelig (1983)

Germaine GreerAlso in Town Bloody Hall (1979)

Michael JeterAlso in Zelig (1983)

Lars EkborgAlso in Duet for Cannibals (1969)

Geneviève PageAlso in Brother Carl (1971)

Nicole StéphaneAlso in Waiting For Godot... In Sarajevo (1993)

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