Past Speaker

Walter Kirn

Novelist, Literary Critic, Journalist

Walter Kirn is a novelist, literary critic, and cultural essayist whose work spans fiction, journalism, and social commentary. Educated at Princeton and Oxford, he wrote for New York Magazine, Time, The New Republic, and Harper's before gaining wide recognition for his novel Up in the Air, adapted into the 2009 George Clooney film. His memoir Lost in the Meritocracy chronicles his path from rural Minnesota to the Ivy League. He co-hosts the podcast America This Week and co-founded County Highway, a print magazine covering American life in the tradition of nineteenth-century newspapers.