Jonathan Safran Foer Research Paper

Jonathan Safran Foer’s Contribution to Literature

Genuine literature is often produced from an author’s intuition. Creative, magical literature is created when an author opens up his or her mind to a reader. Many authors admit to following their instincts when writing rather than following perfected guidelines. Jonathan Safran Foer, an accomplished author, has written several award-winning books that he claims were created through a non-traditional process.

Jonathan Safran Foer’s childhood shaped his adult life and his writing style. On February 21, 1977, Albert and Esther Foer welcomed their second child, Jonathan, into the world (“Home.” 1). Albert, a lawyer, and Esther, a business woman, had three children and were Jewish parents

He pursued a degree in Philosophy at Princeton University in New Jersey (Walker 1). While attending school, Foer met Joyce Carol Oates, an author who encouraged Jonathan to expand his writings and to share them with others (Walker 1). Her encouragement stemmed from the fact that Foer won the Creative Writing Thesis Prize every year that he attended Princeton (Foer 1). When asked about Oates, Foer states, “She was the first person to ever make me think I should try to write in any sort of serious way. And my life really changed after that” (Walker 1). After earning his degree at Princeton, Foer enrolled at the Mount Sinai School of Medicine, “before realizing that such a career was not for him” (Walker 1). Once Foer made the decision to pursue writing, he took his winning thesis that he wrote at Princeton and expanded it into his first novel, Everything is Illuminated (Walker 1). Everything is Illuminated earned Foer the Jewish Book Award and the Guardian First Book Award (Walker 1). A movie was produced in 2005 that was based on the contents of this book. Foer’s Second Novel, Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close, was another success. Although there was skepticism surrounding it, Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close produced great sales and was turned into a movie. Jonathan Safran Foer’s journey to becoming an