Alex Myers
American writer and activist (born c.1979)
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Alex Myers (born c.1979) is an American author, educator and transgender rights activist.
Alex Myers | |
|---|---|
| Born | c.1979 Paris, Maine, U.S. |
| Education | |
| Website | |
| alexmyerswriting | |
Early life and education
Myers was born in Paris, Maine.[1] As a teenager, he attended Phillips Exeter Academy in New Hampshire.[2] He obtained a bachelor's degree from Harvard University, where he studied near Eastern languages and civilizations.[3] While at Harvard he worked to have gender identity added to the school's nondiscrimination clause.[4] Myers obtained an MA in religion from Brown University.[3] He later studied fine arts at the Vermont College of Fine Arts.[4]
Career
Myers taught English at Phillips Exeter Academy, and currently serves as the director of the Mountain School of Milton Academy.[5][6]
His first book Revolutionary was released in 2014.[4][2] Based on the life of Deborah Sampson, the focus of the novel is a woman who disguises herself as a man in order to fight in the American Revolutionary War.[7][8][9] The book was a finalist for the 2015 Lambda Literary Award for Transgender Fiction.[10]
Released in 2019, his novel Continental Divide follows Ron Bancroft who grows up as a tomboy, comes out as a teenager and travels west to find himself.[11][12] In an interview with New Hampshire Public Radio Myers discussed how his own experience with transitioning was reflected in the main character Ron in his novel Continental Divide explaining: "The parallels in my own life would be a rural childhood, a feeling of always being a boy despite society telling me that I was a girl, and then going off to a more urban college experience with a bit more exposure to a range of differences."[13]
Myers' third book The Story of Silence (2020) is a retelling of Le Roman de Silence.[14]
Personal life
Myers is a transgender man.[4][1] He began transitioning in 1995 during his senior year at Phillips Exeter Academy.[2] Having studied the first three years as a woman, he returned to campus senior year with his hair cut and requested that he be called Alex.[1] The transition made him the first openly transgender student in the school's history.[5][15]
Publications
Novels
- Revolutionary (2014)
- Continental Divide (2019)
- The Story of Silence (2020)
- The Symmetry of Stars (2021)
Non-fiction
- Supporting Transgender Students: Understanding Gender Identity and Reshaping School Culture (2021)
Articles
- Myers, Alex (May 14, 2018). "Trans Terminology Seems Like It's Changing All the Time. And That's a Good Thing". Slate Magazine. Retrieved September 10, 2022.