Autobiography of Red

FROM ANNE CARSON, WINNER OF THE 2026 NOBEL PRIZE IN LITERATURE

“A profound love story” (The New York Times Book Review) that is both a novel and a poem, an unconventional re-creation of an ancient Greek myth and a wholly original coming-of-age story set in the present

NEW YORK TIMES NOTABLE BOOK • NATIONAL BOOK CRITICS CIRCLE AWARD FINALIST

Geryon, a young boy who is also a winged red monster, reveals the volcanic terrain of his fragile, tormented soul in an autobiography he begins at the age of five. As he grows older, Geryon escapes his abusive brother and affectionate but ineffectual mother, finding solace behind the lens of his camera and in the arms of a young man named Herakles, a cavalier drifter who leaves him at the peak of infatuation. When Herakles reappears years later, Geryon confronts again the pain of his desire and embarks on a journey that will unleash his creative imagination to its fullest extent.

By turns whimsical and haunting, erudite and accessible, richly layered and deceptively simple, Autobiography of Red is a tremendously moving portrait of an artist coming to terms with the fantastic accident of who he is.