Donna Tartt's first novel, The Secret History (1992), was a publishing phenomenon; it sold over five million copies and has been translated into over twenty languages. During the next decade, Tartt published several short stories, “Tam O'Shanter” (The New Yorker, April 1993), “A Christmas Pageant” (Harper's, December 1993), and “A Garter Snake” (GQ, May 1995), the memoirs, “Sleepytown: A Southern Gothic Childhood, with Codeine” (Harper's, July 1992), “Basketball Season”, and “Team spirit: Memories of Being a Freshman Cheerleader for the Basketball Team” (Harper's, April 1994), and a number of essays for Oxford American. Her long-awaited second novel, The Little Friend, appeared in 2002. Tartt is represented by the literary agent Amanda (Binky) Urban, and her editor is Gary Fisketjon at Knopf.
Donna Louise Tartt was born in Greenwood, Mississippi in 1963, the eldest daughter of...
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Citation: Sullivan, Lindsay. "Donna Tartt". The Literary Encyclopedia. First published 29 April 2005 [https://www.litencyc.com/php/speople.php?rec=true&UID=5220, accessed 05 December 2025.]
