Steven Naifeh
Author of Van Gogh: The Life
About the Author
Steven Naifeh was born in Tehran, Iran, June 19, 1952, to parents in the U.S. Diplomatic Service. He attended Princeton University receiving an A.B. summa cum laude in American History, Harvard Law School receiving a J.D., Harvard Graduate School of School of Arts and Sciences, receiving both an show more M.A. and a PhD, and University of South Carolina receiving a Ph.D. in Humane Letters. Naifeh co-authored, with Gregory White Smith, Jackson Pollock: An American Saga which received the Pulitzer Prize for Biography in 1991 and was a finalist for National Book Award Nonfiction in 1990. He and Smith also co-authored Final Justice which was an Edgar Allan Poe Award Finalist in Fact Crime in 1994. Naifeh's other books include Culture Making (Princeton University Press, 1978); Gene Davis (The Arts Publisher, 1982); New York Times bestsellers, The Mormon Murders (Weidenfeld & Nicolson, 1988) and, with Phil Donahue, The Human Animal (Simon & Schuster, 1985); and Vincent van Gogh, with Gregory White Smith (Random House, 2011). (Bowker Author Biography) show less
Works by Steven Naifeh
Tagged
Common Knowledge
- Legal name
- Naifeh, Steven
- Birthdate
- 1952
- Gender
- male
- Nationality
- USA
- Birthplace
- Tehran, Iran
- Places of residence
- Aiken, South Carolina, USA
- Education
- Princeton University
Harvard University
University of South Carolina Aiken - Occupations
- artist
- Relationships
- Smith, Gregory White (partner)
- Short biography
- Steven Naifeh is an Arab-American both by lineage (his grandparents were born in a part of Syria that is now Lebanon and Jordan) and by upbringing. As the son of diplomats, he spread his childhood throughout the Middle East — in Jordan, Iraq, Iran, Libya, and Oman as well as the U.A.E. He also lived in Pakistan and Nigeria. Naifeh, together with Gregory White Smith, has also written nine additional nonfiction books, including the New York Times bestsellers, The Mormon Murders (New York: Weidenfeld & Nicolson, 1988) and, with Phil Donahue, The Human Animal (New York: Simon & Schuster, 1985).
Members
Reviews
By far the saddest biography I have ever read, VAN GOGH is also one of the most stirring and superbly detailed biographies I have ever read. That Vincent van Gogh's life was such a brutally painful and difficult one should not deter readers from embarking on this massive journey, yet the fact that a 951-page book reaches page 750 before the subject has what could genuinely be called a period of happiness is a testament to the skill with which the book is written, for despite the utterly depressing nature of Van Gogh's life, the authors make it a terrifically compelling one to read about. The amount of detail, in no small part but not entirely due to the prodigious correspondence that exists between Vincent and his brother Theo, is as complete as any biography could (or should) aspire to, and by the end of the book, one feels as though as though one has lived alongside Vincent through almost his entire life. The book approaches yet manages to skirt oppressiveness of detail, a superb feat given the consistency of the arc of Van Gogh's tortured life, and while the repetitious nature of Van Gogh's behavior and follies becomes almost as tiresome as it must have for his family, there is nothing in the book that should have been left out. The authors, too, have a splendid sense of art and how Van Gogh's mind was reflected in his art, and all this is described with clarity and, and at the same time, poetry. I wept as I reached the end of Vincent's life, in part because it was such a sad and unhappy life, but also because by the book's end, I felt as though I knew and understood the man behind some of the greatest art in history. Such should be the goal of every biography.… (more)
A beautiful piece of work, and a labor of love in more ways than one. Artist, art historian, and biographer Steven Naifeh has put together an opulent assemblage of chapters discussing Vincent Van Gogh's artistic influences: artists and works that delighted him, taught him, and inspired him, from academics and old masters like Gerome, Holbein, Rembrandt, and Ruisdael; through locals like his cousin Mauve and regional schools like the Barbizon painters and the Hague School; to the Impressionist, Symbolist, Cloisonnist and other contemporaries like Gauguin, Lautrec, Signac, and Serusier, as well as Japanese prints and English magazine illustrations. Arranged thematically, Naifeh demonstrates how these other artists influenced and dazzled Vincent in how he saw, experienced and painted human figures, flowers, landscapes, skies, seas, trees, books, and religious belief. Naifeh expertly shows us unexpected and wonderfully apt correspondences, such as Luke Fildes's poignant drawing of Charles Dickens's empty chair after his death, and Vincent's lurid armchair vacated by Gauguin after their rupture; or a Decamps "Orientalist" courtyard opposite Vincent's blazing Arles "Yellow House." Many of the gorgeous color plates are captioned with comments from Vincent himself, underlining his thoughts about them.
As I paged through the book, admiring many pictures I was not familiar with, I began to notice... wait, Naifeh and his partner Gregory White Smith own this painting? And this one, and that one, and that print? Holy smoke... In a final chapter, Naifeh describes his ventures with Smith (in work, art, and life - they were together for 40 years until Smith's death from a brain tumor in 2014), in researching and writing their acclaimed biographies of Jackson Pollock and Van Gogh, and their tiptoeing into collecting. Clearly they had more money than he modestly cares to admit, but they also had taste, knowledge, and passion. So this book is also a showcase for the wonderful works they have collected. I'm also quietly glad to find someone who seems to share my furtive admiration of Gerome. (In spite of the often icky subject matter, nobody can paint sighthounds or big cats like Gerome!)
Though Naifeh credits White with the writer's gift, his own language often sings with color and admiration. The plates are rich, plentiful, well-arranged. This volume is a pure pleasure and belongs in any art history collection.… (more)
As I paged through the book, admiring many pictures I was not familiar with, I began to notice... wait, Naifeh and his partner Gregory White Smith own this painting? And this one, and that one, and that print? Holy smoke... In a final chapter, Naifeh describes his ventures with Smith (in work, art, and life - they were together for 40 years until Smith's death from a brain tumor in 2014), in researching and writing their acclaimed biographies of Jackson Pollock and Van Gogh, and their tiptoeing into collecting. Clearly they had more money than he modestly cares to admit, but they also had taste, knowledge, and passion. So this book is also a showcase for the wonderful works they have collected. I'm also quietly glad to find someone who seems to share my furtive admiration of Gerome. (In spite of the often icky subject matter, nobody can paint sighthounds or big cats like Gerome!)
Though Naifeh credits White with the writer's gift, his own language often sings with color and admiration. The plates are rich, plentiful, well-arranged. This volume is a pure pleasure and belongs in any art history collection.… (more)
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- 21
- Members
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- Popularity
- #15,026
- Rating
- 3.9
- Reviews
- 23
- ISBNs
- 78
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- 10
Having recently read Carol Wallace's Leaving Van Gogh with Goodread's Art Lovers group, I must say that I think her book should be banned for using real people in a fiction that is so far from the known facts.
Naifeh and White make a thoroughly convincing case for Vincent's illness having been temporal lobe epilepsy. In fact, that was the diagnosis at the hospital in Arles where he was first treated for his mental illness after he mutilated his ear. Why so many other theories about his illness clouded the issue is unclear to me, when the original diagnosis and all his symptoms pointed directly to temporal lobe epilepsy.
And finally, the short discussion about Vincent's death and why the authors do not believe it was a suicide, is also totally convincing. Reading their assertions and the reasons for them (both pertaining to the diagnosis of his illness and the cause of his death) leaves no room for any other theory, as far as I'm concerned. If for no other reason, the fact that all the painting gear that he had taken with him that day as well as the revolver that he was shot with were never found would point to it NOT being a suicide. Poor wonderful, talented, brilliant Vincent.
This is an essential book for anyone who is truly interested in Vincent van Gogh.… (more)