About Ethan Gilsdorf
"The hardest-working geek we know, Ethan Gilsdorf."—The Boston Phoenix
"Ethan Gilsdorf ... brings a bit of international cachet as well as a lively, engaging reading style ... he is known for an eloquent yet accessible fusion of the natural world and urban culture."—The Boston Globe
"Boston nerdlord writer Ethan Gilsdorf"—The Quad
"Somerville’s resident d20 dorkwad"—The Weekly Dig
"Adorably amusing"—The Bostonist.com
"[Gilsdorf] captivated the audience with his passionate, inflective reading"— The Somerville News
Shorter biography:
Ethan Gilsdorf is a journalist, memoirist, critic, poet, teacher and geek.
Ethan Gilsdorf is the author of the award-winning travel memoir investigation Fantasy Freaks and Gaming Geeks: An Epic Quest for Reality Among Role Players, Online Gamers, and Other Dwellers of Imaginary Realms.
Based in Somerville, Massachusetts, he publishes travel, arts, and pop culture stories, essays and reviews regularly in the New York Times, Boston Globe, Salon.com, and wired.com and has published hundreds of articles in dozens of other magazines, newspapers, websites and guidebooks worldwide, including BoingBoing, CNN.com, io9.com, Playboy, National Geographic Traveler, Psychology Today, Christian Science Monitor, San Francisco Chronicle, USA Today, Washington Post, Los Angeles Times and Fodor's travel guides.
He is a core contributor to the blog "GeekDad" at wired.com, his blog "Geek Pride" is seen regularly on PsychologyToday.com, and he is a regular contributor to Boston NPR affiliate WBUR's Cognoscenti blog. He is a book and film critic for the Boston Globe, and is the film columnist for Art New England. He also contributes to Boston.com, Tor.com; TheOneRing.net and Forces of Geek.
Heck, his work has even been included in a textbook.
To research various writing projects, Gilsdorf has interviewed Sir Ben Kingsley, Steve Carell, Viggo Mortensen, Andy Serkis, Seth Rogen, and Sister Helen Prejean, among other cultural figures. He has acted as an Hollywood extra, walked across Scotland, mountain biked the French Pyrenees, worn a tunic for two weeks while camping with 12,000 medieval reenactors. And yes, he has consumed champagne with Kate Hudson.
Gilsdorf has appeared frequently on radio and television programs in the U.S. and France, including PBS Off Book, The Discovery Channel and Air America; several nationally-syndicated National Public Radio programs; and has been interviewed for various documentary films. He has given lectures at universities and libraries nationwide, and has appeared as a guest at film festivals, gaming conventions, and book festivals in the U.S. and Europe. An award-winning poet, he has published poems in Poetry, The Southern Review, and The North American Review, and several anthologies. He is co-founder of Grub Street's Young Adult Writers Program (YAWP) and teaches creative writing workshops at Grub Street, where he alse serves on the Board of Directors.
Follow Ethan’s adventures at http://www.ethangilsdorf.com & http://www.fantasyfreaksbook.com; Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/fantasyfreaksbook; Twitter: "ethanfreak"
>Longer biography:
Ethan Gilsdorf is a journalist, memoirist, critic, poet, teacher and geek.
Gilsdorf is the author of the award-winning book Fantasy Freaks and Gaming Geeks: An Epic Quest for Reality Among Role Players, Online Gamers, and Other Dwellers of Imaginary Realms, his travel memoir investigation into fantasy and gaming subcultures.
The Huffington Post calls Fantasy Freaks and Gaming Geeks “part personal odyssey, part medieval mid-life crisis, and part wide-ranging survey of all things freaky and geeky." National Public Radio described the book as "Lord of the Rings meets Jack Kerouac’s On the Road" and Wired.com proclaimed, “For anyone who has ever spent time within imaginary realms, the book will speak volumes.” It was named a Must-Read Book by the Massachusetts Book Awards.
To research various writing projects, Gilsdorf has interviewed Sir Ben Kingsley, Steve Carell, Viggo Mortensen, Andy Serkis, Sister Helen Prejean, Seth Rogen, Guillermo del Toro, David Carradine, George Romero, Chris Cooper, Guillermo del Toro, Richard Taylor, Bobby and Peter Farrelly, and Nick Frost and Simon Pegg, among other cultural figures. He has taste-tested caffeinated beer; acted as an Hollywood extra; and embarked on a quest for the perfect French fry. He has walked across Scotland, mountain biked the French Pyrenees, explored caves in New York State and backpacked through India. Yes, he has consumed champagne with Kate Hudson.
Over his working life, he's been employed as a dump truck driver, a movie projectionist, an A/V nerd, a bookseller and a landfill manager.
After playing Dungeons & Dragons religiously in the 1970s and 1980s (he still plays the game), Ethan Gilsdorf has worked as a freelance correspondent, guidebook writer, and film, book and restaurant reviewer in Paris and the U.S. Now based in Somerville, Massachusetts, he publishes travel, arts, and pop culture stories and essays regularly in the New York Times, Boston Globe, Salon.com, and wired.com and has published hundreds of articles in dozens of other magazines, newspapers, websites and guidebooks worldwide, including BoingBoing, CNN.com, io9.com, Playboy, National Geographic Traveler, Psychology Today, San Francisco Chronicle, USA Today, Washington Post, Los Angeles Times, Christian Science Monitor, Fodor's travel guides, Australian Financial Review, The Walrus (Toronto), The Citizen (Ottawa), The Sunday Post (Glasgow), Emirates Inflight Magazine, Sunday Times (Johannesburg) and elsewhere.
Heck, his work has even been included in a textbook.
He is a core contributor to the blog "GeekDad" at wired.com, his blog "Geek Pride" is seen regularly on PsychologyToday.com, and he is a regular contributor to Boston NPR affiliate WBUR's Cognoscenti blog. He is a book and film critic for the Boston Globe, former bicycling culture columnist for the Boston Globe, and is the film columnist for Art New England. He also contributes to Boston.com, Tor.com; TheOneRing.net and Forces of Geek.
Gilsdorf has been a guest as a fantasy and escapism expert on radio and television programs such as PBS Off Book, The Discovery Channel, the French TV channel Arte's documentary "La Revanche des Geeks" ("Revenge of the Geeks"); CBC's' "Definitely Not the Opera"; Public Radio International's "To the Best of Our Knowledge"; Air America's "Inside Story"; and several nationally-syndicated National Public Radio programs including "Around And About," Wisconsin Public Radio, WAMC (NY)'s "Roundtable"; as well as WBUR's "Radio Boston" and "All Things Considered," WGBH's Calley Crossley Show, and numerous poscasts and web radio programs. He has also been interviewed for various documentary films. He has appeared as a featured guest at events such as Switzerland's Neuchâtel International Fantastic Film Festival, and at conventions such as Pax East, Gen Con, DragonCon, Boskone, Arisia, and SnowCon.
Gilsdorf has given lectures at universities such as MIT, Notre Dame, Louisiana State University, and the University of Southern California, and read at book festivals and libraries nationwide including the Boston Public Library, Fayetteville (AR) Public Library, the Boston Book Festival, Decatur Book Festival (Atlanta), Brooklyn Book Festival and the Twin Cities Book Festival (Minneapolis). He has given hundreds of readings and performances at bookstores, bars, libraries and cafes throughout the U.S., as well as in Paris, London, Puerto Rico and Middle-earth.
He has received fellowships and residencies from the Somerville Arts Council, Vermont Studio Center, Millay Colony for the Arts and the Hall Farm Arts Center.
As a poet, he is the winner of the Hobblestock Peace Poetry Competition and the Esme Bradberry Contemporary Poets Prize, and has published poems in Poetry, The Southern Review, The North American Review, Exquisite Corpse and several anthologies such as Short Fuse: A Global Anthology of New Fusion Poetry, Outsiders: Poems About Rebels, Exiles and Renegades and 100 Poets Against the War, among others.
He is co-founder of Grub Street's Young Adult Writers Program (YAWP), volunteers as a guest speaker in the Boston Public Schools and leads memoir, narrative non-fiction, journalism, travel writing and creative writing workshops at Grub Street, Emerson College, Media Bistro and, for younger students, in schools and community centers, including the Somerville Public Library.
He serves on the Board of Directors of Grub Street, a non-profit creative writing center dedicated to nurturing writers and connecting readers with the wealth of writing talent in the Boston area, and the Boston Book Festival Program Committee.
Todd Swift, poet, author of Cafe Alibi, and editor of SHORT FUSE: The Global Anthology of New Fusion Poetry, says: "Ethan Gilsdorf strikes me as a poetic Henry James for the 21st century, the cosmopolitan American in Europe, casting a cold eye on the old and new worlds, and delivering an elegant retort to any suggestion that lyricism and wit cannot lie in the same bed. He is one of the best of a new generation of poets emerging now, and should be read."
To research Fantasy Freaks and Gaming Geeks, Gilsdorf traveled from Boston to England, France to New Zealand, Planet Earth to the realm of Aggramar. He hung out with Harry Potter tribute bands, attended fan conventions and gaming tournaments, camped with 12,000 medieval reenactors for a week, sewed his own tunic, learned to sword fight (badly), battled online goblins and trolls, and played Dungeons & Dragons again for the first time in 25 years. He does not own elf ears, but he has kept all his old D&D gear, and has been known to host a Lord of the Rings party or two.
Follow Ethan’s adventures at http://www.ethangilsdorf.com & http://www.fantasyfreaksbook.com; Facebook:http://www.facebook.com/fantasyfreaksbook; Twitter: "ethanfreak"