Phillip Lopate was born in Brooklyn, New York in 1943. He has written three personal essay collections, two novels, two poetry collections, a memoir of his teaching experiences, a collection of his movie criticism, an urbanist meditation, and a biographical monograph.
In addition, there is a Phillip Lopate reader, Getting Personal: Selected Writings (Basic Books, 2003). His most recent books are Two Marriages (novellas, Other Press, 2008), and Notes on Sontag (Princeton University Press, 2009). He has also edited many anthologies and is widely published in periodicals and anthologies. He has been awarded a Guggenheim Fellowship, a NY Public Library Center for Scholars and Writers Fellowship, two NEA grants, and two NY Foundation for the Arts grants. He is the recipient of a Christopher medal, a Texas Institute of Letters award for best non-fiction book of the, and was a finalist for the PEN best essay book of the year. After working with children for twelve years as a writer in the schools, he has taught creative writing and literature at a number of colleges and universities and is now a Professor at Columbia University.
