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Sharon Gelman

Fiction, Literary, Non-Fiction, Prose

About the Artist

Sharon Gelman is a writer, editor, media producer, public speaker, and activist. She was the US managing editor and lead US interviewer for 200 Women: Who Will Change the Way You See the World (Chronicle, 2017; Hachette Audio, 2019). She conceived of and produced the Nelson Mandela’s Favorite African Folktales audiobook (Hachette, 2009), directed by Alfre Woodard and featuring twenty-six acclaimed performing artists, which won numerous awards including the Audie Awards for Best Audiobook of the Year and Best Multi-Voice Performance as well as a Grammy nomination. Gelman also lectures on the relationship between arts and activism and the craft challenges of writing inclusive fiction.  Her work has been recognized with a Maryland Independent Artists Award, the Page One First Prize for Novelists, grants from the Arts & Humanities Council of Montgomery County, Story Foundation Prize semi-finalist, Stories Matter Foundation Doro Boehme Scholarship, LitCamp Full Scholarship, Program for Writers Alumni Fellowship, Vermont Studio Center Residency Scholarship, South Africa Partners Global Citizen Award, Norman Mailer Center Fiction Scholarship, Selah Leadership Fellowship, iTunes’ Best Fiction Audiobooks, AudioFile’s Best Audiobooks, Library Journal Editors’ Fall Pick, Audible.com Top 5 Audiobooks for Kids and Young Adults, Emusic.com Best Audiobooks, People for the American Way Foundation’s Democracy Award, and Good Things Award for Connecting the Arts and Social Justice. For over two decades, Gelman headed Artists for a New South Africa, a nonprofit founded and supported by leading performing artists and guided by noted African leaders including Nelson Mandela and Desmond Tutu. She holds an MFA in Creative Writing from the Program for Writers at Warren Wilson College and has workshopped at Bread Loaf, Tin House, StoryStudio Chicago, Fine Arts Work Center, and Macondo. She is at work on her first novel, which is taking approximately forever.

Sharon Gelman website Sharon Gelman, writer and editor Sharon Gelman website 2021 Page One Prize for Novelists Sharon Gelman website Mandela's Favorite African Folktales

Featured Work

Photos

I conceived of, produced, co-cast, and wrote the opening track for this multiple award-winning audiobook of folktales selected by Mr. Mandela, directed by Alfre Woodard with an opening track by Archbishop Tutu and readings by notable actors including Gillian Anderson, Benjamin Bratt,LeVar Burton, Don Cheadle, Matt Damon, Whoopi Goldberg, Sean Hayes, Hugh Jackman, Samuel L. Jackson, Scarlett Johansson, Debra Messing, Helen Mirren, Parminder Nagra, Sophie Okonedo, CCH Pounder, Alan Rickman, Jurnee Smollett, Charlize Theron, Blair Underwood, and Forest Whitaker with original music by South African legends Johnny Clegg and Vusi Mahlasela. Published by Hachette, all profits were donated to programs serving children orphaned by HIV/AIDS, which garnered extensive broadcast, print, and online coverage including CNN, NPR, MSNBC, AP, BET, Extra, VH1, and MTV.
I served as the US managing editor and lead US interviewer for the international book and traveling exhibition, arranging the participation of 65 women including Isabel Allende, Gillian Anderson, Margaret Atwood, Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie, Rabbi Sharon Brous, Angela Davis, Justice Ruth Bader Ginzburg, Alicia Garza, Roxane Gay, Dolores Huerta, Callie Khouri, Renee Montagne, Ai-jen Poo, Geena Rocero, Linda Sarsour, Maria Shriver, Gabourey Sidibe, Jurnee Smollett, Julie Taymor, Alice Waters, Nobel Laureate Jody Williams, Alfre Woodard, and Marion Wright Edelman. The book was published in 2017 by Chronicle Books in the US, Canada, and UK, Echo in Australia, Bookstorm in South Africa, and Upstart in New Zealand. I conceived of the audiobook version, published by Hachette in 2019. The exhibition premiered at the Sydney Opera House in 2017 and in 2018 showed in New York at Frieze Art Fair and Pen + Brush Gallery and at Alte Bayerische Staatsbank in Munich

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