Dunn, Katherine 1945–

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Dunn, Katherine 1945–

(Katherine Karen Dunn)

PERSONAL: Born October 24, 1945, in Garden City, KS; daughter of Jack (a linotype operator) and Velma (Golly) Dunn; children: Eli Malachy Dunn Dapolonia. Education: Attended Portland State College (now University) and Reed College.

AWARDS, HONORS: Music Corporation of America writing grant; Rockefeller writing grant.

WRITINGS:

NOVELS

Attic, Harper (New York City), 1970, reprinted, Warner Books, 1990.

Truck, Harper, 1971, reprinted, Warner Books, 1990.

Geek Love, Knopf (New York City), 1989, reprinted, Warner Books, 1990.

OTHER

Why Do Men Have Nipples? And Other Low-Life Answers to Real-Life Questions, Warner Books, 1992.

(Introduction) Death Scenes: A Homicide Detective's Scrapbook, by Jack Huddleston, Feral House, 1996.

Also author of film script of Truck.

SIDELIGHTS: Katherine Dunn's novel Geek Love is, according to Jeff VanderMeer in the St. James Guide to Horror, Ghost and Gothic Writers, "a modern Gothic classic." VanderMeer explains that "the book's artistic success depends upon its risky structure: two strands (past and present) that alternate chapters, each strand offering insight into the other. Much like the novel's Siamese twins, the two stories intertwine to form one cohesive narrative. This double story-line forces the reader to continually re-evaluate the characters and to reassess Dunn's slant on morality."

Both story strands are narrated by the same character, Olympia Binewski, "an albino hunchback dwarf," as VanderMeer describes her. In the present-day narrative, Olympia tells of her attempts to keep her daughter out of the clutches of a wealthy, sadistic woman. The past narrative describes Olympia's childhood among carnival performers, one of whom has created a cult in which people without deformities purposely mutilate themselves to become "freaks." Geek Love, VanderMeer notes, contains "commentaries on society [which] run like a hidden vein of satire throughout the book. Dunn's explorations of the utter mercilessness of science when applied by human beings provides a needed counterpoint to her sometimes repetitive lesson that the true monsters are often hidden behind handsome faces with charming smiles."

Dunn once told CA: "I have been a believer in the magic of language since, at a very early age, I discovered that some words got me into trouble and others got me out. The revelations since then have been practically continuous.

"There are other inclinations that have shaped the form and direction of my work: rampant curiosity, a cynical inability to accept face-values balanced by lunatic optimism, and the preoccupation with the effervescing qualities of truth that is probably common to those afflicted by absent-mindedness, prevarication, and general unease in the presence of facts. But the miraculous nature of words themselves contains the discipline.

"Writing is, increasingly, a moral issue for me. The evasion of inexpensive facility, the rejection of the flying bridges built so seductively into the language, require a constant effort of will. The determination required for honest exploration and analysis of the human terrain is often greater than I command. But the fruits of that determination seem worthy of all my efforts."