Michael Mark Brodsky (born Aug 2, 1948) is a scientific/medical editor, novelist, playwright, and short story writer. He is best known for his novels ''

Xman ''Xman'' (sometimes referred to as ''XMAN'') is Michael Brodsky's third novel. It tells the parody philosophical tale of Xman, a universal nobodyNYT review who arrives in Manhattan and drifts between arguments, interviews, accidents, hospitals ...

'' and '' ***'', as well as for his translation of

Samuel Beckett Samuel Barclay Beckett (; 13 April 1906 – 22 December 1989) was an Irish novelist, dramatist, short story writer, theatre director, poet, and literary translator. His literary and theatrical work features bleak, impersonal and tragicomic ex ...

's '' Eleuthéria''.

Early life and education

Michael Brodsky was born in

New York City New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the most densely populated major city in the U ...

, the son of Martin and Marian Brodsky. He attended the

Bronx High School of Science The Bronx High School of Science, commonly called Bronx Science, is a public specialized high school in The Bronx in New York City. It is operated by the New York City Department of Education. Admission to Bronx Science involves passing the Sp ...

.''Detour'', author information He received a 1969 BA from

Columbia College, Columbia University Columbia College is the oldest undergraduate college of Columbia University, situated on the university's main campus in Morningside Heights in the borough of Manhattan in New York City. It was founded by the Church of England in 1754 as King's ...

, taught math and science in New York for a year, attended Case Western Reserve University medical school for two years, then taught French and English in Cleveland until 1975. Brodsky returned to New York City in 1976, working as an editor for the Institute for Research on Rheumatic Diseases. He married Laurence Lacoste. They are the parents of two children, Joseph Matthew and Matthew Daniel. From 1985 to 1991, Brodsky was an editor with

Springer-Verlag Springer Science+Business Media, commonly known as Springer, is a German multinational publishing company of books, e-books and peer-reviewed journals in science, humanities, technical and medical (STM) publishing. Originally founded in 1842 ...

. After 1991, he was with the

United Nations The United Nations (UN) is an intergovernmental organization whose stated purposes are to maintain international peace and security, develop friendly relations among nations, achieve international cooperation, and be a centre for harmonizi ...

. Brodsky lives on

Roosevelt Island Roosevelt Island is an island in New York City's East River, within the borough of Manhattan. It lies between Manhattan Island to the west, and the borough of Queens, on Long Island, to the east. Running from the equivalent of East 46th to 8 ...

Bibliography

Novels

*''

Detour __NOTOC__ A detour or (British English: diversion) is a (normally temporary) route taking traffic around an area of prohibited or reduced access, such as a construction site. Standard operating procedure for many roads departments is to route an ...

'', 1978 * ''Circuits'', 1983 * ''

'',

Four Walls Eight Windows Four Walls Eight Windows was an American independent book publisher in New York City. Known as 4W8W or Four Walls, the company was notable for its dual commitment to progressive politics and adventurous, edgy literary fiction. History Four W ...

, 1987 * ''

Dyad Dyad or dyade may refer to: Arts and entertainment * Dyad (music), a set of two notes or pitches * ''Dyad'' (novel), by Michael Brodsky, 1989 * ''Dyad'' (video game), 2012 * ''Dyad 1909'' and ''Dyad 1929'', ballets by Wayne McGregor Other uses ...

'', Four Walls Eight Windows, 1989 * '' ***'', Four Walls Eight Windows, 1994 * ''

We Can Report Them ''We Can Report Them'' is Michael Brodsky's sixth novel. The novel intertwines death and creation, centering on the making of a commercial glorifying a serial killer's last days. Bert, the commercial's director, must also deal with two termina ...

'', Four Walls Eight Windows, 1999

Short stories

* ''Wedding Feast'', 1981 * ''Project'', 1982 * ''X in Paris'', 1988 * ''Three Goat Songs'', 1991 * ''Southernmost'', 1996 * ''Limit Point'', 2007

Plays

* ''Terrible Sunlight'', 1980 * ''Packet Piece'', 1982 * ''No Packet Piece'', 1982 * ''Dose Center'', 1990 * ''Night of the Chair'', 1990 * ''Six Scenes: A Barracks Brawl'', 1994 * ''The Anti-Muse'', reading 1996, performance 2000

Translation

* '' Eleuthéria'', by

, written 1947, suppressed, published 1995

Nonfiction

*"Svevo: The Artist as Analyzand", ''Review of Existential Psychology and Psychiatry'', 15 no. 2-3 (1977), pp 112–133. *"Toward the Plane of the Sacred: Hafftka’s Great Chain of Being
essay
in th

for

Michael Hafftka Michael Hafftka is an American figurative expressionist painter living in New York City. His work is represented in the permanent collections of a number of museums, including: The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York Museum of Modern Art, Broo ...

"A Retrospective: Large Oils 1985-2003" (2004).Hafftka was the illustrator (cover and some internal) for Brodsky's early fiction, and later for

Limit Point In mathematics, a limit point, accumulation point, or cluster point of a set S in a topological space X is a point x that can be "approximated" by points of S in the sense that every neighbourhood of x with respect to the topology on X also conta ...

References

''CANRS'' refers to ''Contemporary Authors New Revision Series'', and ''DLB'' refers to ''Dictionary of Literary Biography''. Full citations are above. {{DEFAULTSORT:Brodsky, Michael American editors Postmodernists Living people 1948 births Columbia College (New York) alumni People from Roosevelt Island