Ottessa Moshfegh
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Ottessa Moshfegh’s Year Has BeenNeither Restful Nor Relaxing
In our fractured, discordant, don’t-speak-for-me present, there stands little chance that any one author could represent the spirit of the age. But Ottessa Moshfegh would be a strong nominee for those in search of a young literary polestar. A daughter of musicians, the 38- year-old novelist attained cult-writer status in the mid 2010s, publishing a novella, a novel, and a short-story collection. But cult interest turned out to be a mere pit stop. After releasing her dark and hilarious emotional barbwire of a novel, 2018’s My Year of Rest and Relaxation, about a privileged 20-something Manhattanite drowning in prescription pills, Moshfegh became a star. The novel was so smart and daring that it was passed among friends with the promise that it contained essential, unkind wisdoms.
