American critic, writer (b. 1955)Not to be confused with Michio Kaku.

Michiko Kakutani (born January 9, 1955) is an American literary critic and former chief book critic for The New York Times. Her awards include a Pulitzer Prize for Criticism.

Contents

• 1 Biography
  • 1.1 Early life
  • 1.2 Career
• 2 Media references
• 3 Works
• 4 Awards
• 5 References
• 6 External links

Biography

Early life

Kakutani, a *anese American, was born on January 9, 1955, in New Haven, Connecticut. She is the only child of Yale mathematician Shizuo Kakutani and his wife Keiko ("Kay") Uchida. Her father was born in *an, her mother was a second-generation *anese-American who was raised in Berkeley, California. Michiko received her B.A. in English literature from Yale University in 1976, where she studied under author and Yale writing professor John Hersey, among others.

Career

Kakutani initially worked as a reporter for The Washington Post, and then from 1977 to 1979 for Time magazine, where Hersey had worked. In 1979, she joined The New York Times as a reporter.

Kakutani was a literary critic for The New York Times from 1983 until her retirement in 2017. Her occasionally harsh reviews of prominent authors have garnered attention and sometimes criticism. For example, in 2006, Kakutani called Jonathan Franzen's The Discomfort Zone "an odious self-portrait of the artist as a young jack*." Franzen subsequently called Kakutani "the stupidest person in New York City". In 2012, Kakutani wrote a negative review of N*im Nicholas Taleb's Antifragile. In 2018, Taleb stated in his book Skin in the Game that "someone has to have read the book to notice that a reviewer is full of baloney, so in the absence of skin in the game, reviewers such as Michiko Kakutani" can "go on forever without anyone knowing" that they are fabricating and drunk. According to Kira Cochrane in The Guardian, such counterattacks may have bolstered Kakutani's reputation as commendably "fearless."

She has been known to write reviews in the voice of movie or book characters, including Brian Griffin, Austin Powers, Holden Caulfield, Elle Woods of Legally Blonde, and Truman Capote's character Holly Golightly in Breakfast at Tiffany's.

On July 19, 2007, The New York Times published a pre-release story written by Kakutani about Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows. An account of the ensuing controversy, including the critical comments of some Harry Potter fans, can be found on the newspaper's Public Editor's blog.

Kakutani was parodied in the essay "I Am Michiko Kakutani" by one of her former Yale cl*mates, Colin McEnroe.

Kakutani announced that she was stepping down as chief book critic of the Times on July 27, 2017. In an article summarizing her book reviewing career, a writer in Vanity Fair called her "the most powerful book critic in the English-speaking world" and credited her with boosting the careers of George Saunders, Mary Karr, David Foster Wallace, Jonathan Franzen, Ian McEwan, Martin Amis, and Zadie Smith.

In July 2018, Kakutani published a book criticizing the Trump administration *led The Death of Truth: Notes on Falsehood in the Age of Trump.

Kakutani is a fan of the New York Yankees. Her aunt, Yoshiko Uchida, was an author of children's books.

Media references

• A fictionalized account of Kakutani's life en*led "Michiko Kakutani and the Sadness of the World!" was published in the online and print magazine Essays & Fictions.
• She is referenced in an episode of the HBO series Sex and the City. In "Critical Condition" (season 5, episode 6), Carrie Bradshaw releases a book that Kakutani reviews. Various characters deem the critic's name "too hard to pronounce," including Miranda Hobbes, who memorably states, "Just don't say her name again — it will drive me over the edge."
• She was referenced in an episode of Luca Guadagnino's limited HBO series We Are Who We Are. During the episode "Right Here, Right Now V", Fraser looks up Kakutani's review of The Kindly Ones after the book is recommended by his crush Jonathan.
• Comedian and Saturday Night Live cast member Bowen Yang performed an impression of Kakutani during his audition for the show, later joking that she was perfect for an impression since many are unaware of what she looks or sounds like.

Works

• The Death of Truth: Notes on Falsehood in the Age of Trump (2018) ISBN:978-0525574828
• Ex-Libris: 100+ Books to Read and Re-read (2020) ISBN:9780525574972

Awards

• 1998: Pulitzer Prize for Criticism

References

External links

• *an portal
• Biography portal
• Literature portal

• Michiko Kakutani on Twitter
• Kakutani, Michiko, The New York Times (archive).
• Criticism (biography), Pulitzer Prize, 1998.
• Yagoda, Ben (April 10, 2006), "*essing Michiko Kakutani", Slate.
• Kakutani, Michiko (January 18, 2009), "From Books, President-elect Barack Obama Found His Voice", The New York Times.
• Tamaki, Jillian (July 12, 2018), "Interview: Michiko Kakutani By the Book.", The New York Times.