Caroline Calloway

Caroline Gotschall Calloway is an American Instagram personality known for posting photos with lengthy, memoir-style captions on Instagram. She became popular while she was still a student at the University of Cambridge.

Caroline Calloway
Calloway in 2016
Born
Caroline Calloway Gotschall[1]

Falls Church, Virginia, U.S.
EducationUniversity of Cambridge (BA) Phillips Exeter Academy
OccupationWriter; social media influencer
Websitecarolinecalloway.com

Early life

Calloway was born as Caroline Calloway Gotschall in Falls Church, Virginia. She had her name changed at the age of 17 to Gotschall Calloway.[1] Her maternal great-grandfather is Owen Burns, an entrepreneur and real estate mogul who developed many of the historic structures of Sarasota, Florida.[2][3]

According to her Instagram, Calloway graduated from Phillips Exeter Academy.[4] She attended New York University for several years before dropping out. In 2013, she enrolled at Cambridge University after being rejected twice.[4][5]

Career

Instagram

Calloway joined Instagram in 2012 and experimented with growing her following with Natalie Beach, another student at NYU.[1] Calloway initially bought followers to grow her account.[6] According to Beach, she ghostwrote the image captions for Calloway's audience.[6]

During her senior year at Cambridge, Calloway hired Beach to co-write a book proposal and memoir about Calloway's life. Calloway's literary agent was Byrd Leavell.[1] Leavell has since commented on his experience working with Calloway, stating that she was "deeply unwell, deeply dishonest" and that "It was more important to her to be seen as an author than it was to be an author. She didn’t know how to be an author."[7] Calloway announced via her Instagram stories in 2017 that she was withdrawing from her book deal after failing to fulfill her contract.[8]

In 2019, Natalie Beach wrote an essay for The Cut, "I Was Caroline Calloway", chronicling her toxic friendship and collaborations with Calloway.[6][9] In 2020, Calloway responded to Beach through her self-published website, "I Am Caroline Calloway".[1]

Creativity workshops

In December 2018, Calloway launched an international "Creativity Workshop Tour". This tour was cancelled due to Calloway failing to book venues despite already selling $165 tickets to these events.[6][10] Eventually, Calloway held two events in New York.[8] Scottish reporter Kayleigh Donaldson created a Twitter thread that gained news coverage comparing Calloway's tour to Fyre Festival.[11][12]

In August 2019, Calloway hosted a creativity workshop at an event space in the East Village. Although she specified that press was not invited to the event, a reporter from Vice attended and published an article about her experience, exposing how little the attendees received in return for the price of a ticket.[13]

Books

In January 2020, Calloway announced that she would be writing two books. The first of these books, Scammer, was to be printed on demand on April 1, 2020, and has since been delayed. Calloway claims that her next book, And We Were Like, documenting her time at Cambridge University, is planned for winter 2020 despite her original publisher never confirming her book deal was back on.[14]

Onlyfans

In April 2020, Calloway posted a nude photo of herself on her Twitter account as a "humble apology" to the first part of her essay, I Am Caroline Calloway.[15][16] She later announced her OnlyFans account. When she posted her projected income from the platform, online sex workers criticized her for her privilege in being able to use her existing fame and her condescension towards them.[15][17]

Personal life

Calloway's early Instagram captions chronicled her relationship with her boyfriend, but the two split up in 2016.[18] Since that break-up she has continued to narrate details about her love life on Instagram, but has started covering faces with a blue butterfly to obscure identity.[19]

Calloway has general anxiety disorder and depression.[1] She has been open about her Adderall abuse while at Cambridge.[6][1]

References
  1. Hunt, Elle (April 28, 2020). "'I love fame': how Caroline Calloway survived being cancelled". The Guardian. Retrieved May 16, 2020.
  2. "Instagram influencer Caroline Calloway finds solace in Sarasota". Herald-Tribune.
  3. "Caroline Calloway on Instagram: "My grandma's father's name was Owen Burns..."". Instagram.
  4. Flanagan, Caitlin (September 27, 2019). "Caroline Calloway Isn't A Scammer". The Atlantic. Retrieved February 15, 2020.
  5. "Caroline Calloway on Instagram: "I realized something yesterday that hit me like a folding chair over the head: If Cambridge hadn't rejected me—TWICE—I would have lived a…"". Instagram. Retrieved March 1, 2020.
  6. McNeal, Stephanie (September 25, 2019). "Caroline Calloway Wants To Talk About Why You Love To Hate Her". BuzzFeed. Retrieved February 14, 2020.
  7. https://publicseminar.org/essays/donald-trumps-book-agent-comes-clean-leavell-tucker-max/
  8. McNeal, Stephanie (September 11, 2019). "Who Is Caroline And Why Is Everyone Talking About Her? Let Us Explain". Buzzfeed.
  9. Beach, Natalie (September 10, 2019). "The Story of Caroline Calloway & Her Ghostwriter Natalie". The Cut. Retrieved May 16, 2020.
  10. "Twitter". mobile.twitter.com. Retrieved March 5, 2020.
  11. Kircher, Madison (January 14, 2019). "This Instagram Influencer's Failed Tour Will Satisfy Your Fyre Fest Nostalgia". Thecut.com.
  12. Sicha, Choire; Jonah Engel Bromwich (September 11, 2019). "Who Is Caroline Calloway? An Explainer". The New York Times. Retrieved February 14, 2020.
  13. Iovine, Anna (August 6, 2019). "I Scammed Influencer Caroline Calloway at Her Event, The Scam". Vice. Retrieved February 14, 2020.
  14. McNeal, Stephanie (January 15, 2020). "Caroline Calloway Says She Is Releasing A Book Called "Scammer"". BuzzFeed. Retrieved February 18, 2020.
  15. Downs, Claire (May 14, 2020). "Why Is Everybody Suddenly Selling Their Nudes?". ELLE. Retrieved May 20, 2020.
  16. Calloway, Caroline (April 1, 2020). "I fucked up..." @carolinecaloway. Twitter. Retrieved May 20, 2020.
  17. "Can You Make Six Figures A Year Off Reply Guys? Caroline Calloway Thinks So". Tits and Sass. May 7, 2020. Retrieved May 20, 2020.
  18. Shamsian, Jacob; Frias, Lauren; Heller, Susanna (January 2019). "How Caroline Calloway went from Instagram influencer with a $500,000 book deal to the creator of her personal 'Fyre Festival'". Business Insider. Retrieved February 14, 2020.
  19. Phelan, Hayley (January 30, 2020). "Will You Be My #Content?". The New York Times. Retrieved February 14, 2020.
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