Fitzgerald Museum Awards Min Jin Lee its 2024 Literary Prize
MONTGOMERY, AL – Aug 27, 2024 The Scott and Zelda Fitzgerald Museum awards the Fitzgerald Prize for Literary Excellence annually to an author whose work continues the legacy of American storytelling while also exemplifying the craft, wit, and social insight typified by F. Scott Fitzgerald. F. Scott Fitzgerald was a novelist, short story writer, essayist, screenwriter, playwright, lyricist, poet, and veteran, and the Fitzgerald Prize recognizes an author’s contribution in one or more of these areas. This year, the ninth annual recipient will be American author, Min Jin Lee.
Tickets are free to the public but require a RSVP and are available at Eventbrite: aneveningwithminjinlee.eventbrite.com
Audience members are encouraged to submit questions for the discussion in advance using the Q&A submission link: https://fitzmuse.wufoo.com/forms/an-evening-with-min-jin-lee-audience-questions/
Min Jin Lee is the author of novels Free Food for Millionaires and Pachinko. She is a finalist for the National Book Award. Her essays have appeared in The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, The New Yorker, The New York Review of Books, The Chosun Ilbo, Vogue, and Food & Wine. Lee introduced the Penguin Classics edition of The Great Gatsby. In 2023, Lee served as the Editor of The Best American Shorts Stories. Lee received the Manhae Grand Prize for Literature, the Bucheon Diaspora Literary Award, and the Samsung Happiness for Tomorrow Award for Creativity. She is the recipient of fellowships in Fiction from the Guggenheim Foundation, the Radcliffe Institute of Advanced Study at Harvard, and the New York Foundation for the Arts. Lee was inducted into the Hall of Fame for the New York Foundation for the Arts and New York State Writers. She was honored by the Columbia University Weatherhead East Asian Institute, the Asian American Journalists Association, the Korean American Community Foundation, the Council of Korean Americans, and the Queens Public Library. She is at work on her third novel, American Hagwon and a nonfiction work, Name Recognition. She is a Writer-in-Residence at Amherst College and serves as a trustee of PEN America and a director of the Authors Guild. Lee lives in Harlem with her family.
Ms. Lee’s appreciation of F. Scott’s work, The Great Gatsby is well known. In the New York Review she wrote in 2021, “Nearly a hundred years after its publication, Gatsby is considered “the Greatest American Novel.” I cannot imagine a more persuasive and readable book about lost illusions, class, White Americans in the 1920s, and the perils and vanity of assimilation. It remains a modern novel by exploring the intersection of social hierarchy, White femininity, White male love, and unfettered capitalism. I’ve read and loved Gatsby for a very long time, and with each new reading, my understanding of it has grown more layered and provocative.”
Previous recipients of the Fitzgerald Prize have been best-selling author and journalist, Ta-Nehisi Coates (2024,) retired Navy SEAL and author, Clint Emerson (2022), Pulitzer Prize winning journalist and author Rick Bragg (2021), the ground-breaking social and legal reformer and founder of the Equal Justice Initiative, Bryan Stevenson (2020), and accomplished Alabama authors Frye Gaillard (2019), Wayne Flynt (2018), Katherine Clark (2017) and Kim Cross (2016).
An Evening with Min Jin Lee will be held at the The Hotel Conference area in Auburn Alabama at 7:00 pm. The evening will include the awarding of the 2024 F. Scott Fitzgerald Prize for Literary Excellence by the Scott and Zelda Fitzgerald Museum followed by a discussion between Min Jin Lee, Dr. Alaina Doten, and Dr. Ellie Lee, Director of Auburn’s Korea Center-King Sejong Institute.
“The Fitzgerald Museum is honored to continue the Prize’s tradition of recognizing this country’s most impactful authors. Having Min Jin Lee come to Alabama is doubly special as we celebrate the impact of the vibrant contribution of the Korean American community and Korean cultural heritage to our region specifically. It is an honor to be co-hosting this event with our friends and presenting partners, Auburn’s Korea Center-King Sejong Institute and the office of International Programs!” said Daron. K. Harris, Vice President of the Fitzgerald Museum Board.
The Hotel at Auburn University is located at 241 S College St, Auburn, AL 36830-5429