Louise Wareham Leonard

Louise Wareham Leonard is a New Zealand born American writer of British and indigenous New Zealand Maori descent. Her early books concern childhood sexual abuse and its effects, as well as relationships between men and women. Leonard immigrated to New York City in 1977 and was graduated with a BA from Columbia College, Columbia University in 1987. She has an MA from the Institute of Modern Letters in Wellington, New Zealand.


Career

Age 18, Leonard began working for TIME Magazine; at 20 she received an internship through their collegiate outreach program, and served as an intern reporter in their New York Bureau.

Leonard has published three short novels on sexual abuse and family dynamics: Since You Ask (Akashic Books, New York, 2004) Miss Me A Lot Of (Victoria University Press, New Zealand, 2007) and 52 Men (Red Hen Press, Pasadena, 2015). She has also been published in Poetry, Tin House, The Rumpus.net, Best New Zealand Fiction 1 and many others.

In 2016, Leonard was selected as a Founding Member of the New Zealand Academy of Literature.

In 2016, she founded 52 Men the Podcast: Women Telling Stories about Men with episodes featuring Lynne Tillman, Jane Alison, Caroline Leavitt, Emily Holleman, Mia Funk, Eliza Factor, Julia Slavin and many more.

Awards and Honors

1987 Philoxenian Prize Columbia University; Andrew Fried Memorial Prize for excellence in creative and critical writing, Columbia College, Columbia University, New York; 1999 James Jones First Novel Award for a work in Progress; 2006, 2008 Two time finalist for The New Zealand Prize in Modern Letters; 2008 Creative New Zealand Grant of $18,000

Work with African American and Aboriginal Australians

Leonard was a 25 year friend of artist Charles McGill (1964–2017).

[1] In 2011, she lived for a year in the remote outback town of Mt Magnet in Western Australia, where she co-established a non-for-profit aboriginal-owned art center Wirnda Barna.

Personal life

Leonard is one of four siblings, one of whom is musician and writer Dean Wareham. She is married to investigative editor, Matthew Leonard.

References
  1. Leonard was also personal assistant to Black Liberation Founder James H Cone at the Union Theological Seminary in 1999.

[[Category:People from Wellington City]

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