Eliot Weinberger

Eliot Weinberger (born 6 February 1949 in New York City) is an American writer, essayist, editor, and translator.

He is primarily known for his essays and political articles, the former characterized by their wide-ranging subjects and experimental style, verging on a kind of documentary prose poetry, and the latter highly critical of American politics and foreign policy.

His work regularly appears in translation and has been published in more than thirty languages.

Weinberger's books of literary writings include Works on Paper, Outside Stories, Written Reaction, Karmic Traces, The Stars, Muhammad, the "serial essay" An Elemental Thing, which was selected by the Village Voice as one of the "20 Best Books of the Year," Oranges & Peanuts for Sale, The Ghosts of Birds, and Angels & Saints, selected for the Times Literary Supplement "International Books of the Year."

His political articles are collected in 9/12, What I Heard About Iraq, and What Happened Here: Bush Chronicles, a finalist for the National Book Critics Circle award for criticism and also a TLS "International Books of the Year."

The Guardian (UK) said of What I Heard About Iraq: "Every war has its classic antiwar book, and here is Iraq’s."

Among the other books he has edited are the anthologies American Poetry Since 1950: Innovators & Outsiders and World Beat: International Poetry Now from New Directions.

He is a frequent contributor to the London Review of Books and occasional contributor to the New York Review of Books.

In 2000, Weinberger became the first U.S. literary writer to be awarded the Order of the Aztec Eagle by the government of Mexico.

He was chosen by the German organization Dropping Knowledge as one of a hundred "world's most innovative thinkers."

At the 2005 PEN World Voices Festival, he was presented as a "Post-National Writer."

He lives in New York City.

It has been adapted by others into a prize-winning theater piece, two cantatas, two prize-winning radio plays, a dance performance, and various art installations; it appeared on some tens of thousands of websites, and was read or performed in nearly one hundred events throughout the world on 20 March 2006, the anniversary of the invasion.

When George W. Bush visited Angela Merkel's hometown of Stralsund, Germany, in July 2006, the local residents protested with a public reading of the text.

In 2021, Weinberger was awarded the Jeanette Schocken / Bremerhaven Citizens' Prize for Literature, given biannually to a writer who "sets an example against injustice and violence, against hatred and intolerance."

In their citation, the jurors wrote: “In the spirit of Enlightenment, Weinberger acts in these texts as an agent provocateur for a better world, as a great warner against the loss of freedom and human dignity."

Weinberger's long collaboration and friendship with the Nobel Prize–winning writer and poet Octavio Paz, which began when Weinberger was a teenager, led to many translations of Paz's work, including The Poems of Octavio Paz, In Light of India, and Sunstone.

Among his other translations of Latin American literature are Vicente Huidobro's Altazor, Xavier Villaurrutia's Nostalgia for Death, and Jorge Luis Borges' Seven Nights.

His edition of Borges’ Selected Non-Fictions received the National Book Critics Circle Award for criticism.

The author of a study of Chinese poetry translation, 19 Ways of Looking at Wang Wei, Weinberger is a translator of the poetry of the poet Bei Dao, and the editor of The New Directions Anthology of Classical Chinese Poetry, also a TLS "International Book of the Year."

He is the series editor of Calligrams: Writings from and on China, jointly published by Chinese University of Hong Kong Press and New York Review Books.

Weinberger's 2007 article "Mandaeans", published in Harper's Magazine, was sharply criticized by many Mandaeans, as the article described the Mandaeans' allegedly negative views of other religions and ethnic groups.

From 2015 to 2017, he was the literary editor of the Murty Classical Library of India.

He serves on the Advisory Boards of the Margellos World Republic of Letters (Yale University Press) and the Board of Directors of New Directions Publishing.