Mat Johnson Biography
Mat Johnson is an American fiction writer who writes in both prose and comic books. Johnson made his first move into the comics form with the publication of the five-issue limited series Hellblazer Special: Papa Midnite (Vertigo 2005).
Mat Johnson Age
Mat was born on 19 August 1970, in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, United States of America. He is 53 years old as of August 2023.
Mat Johnson Education
Johnson attended Greene Street Friends School, West Chester University, and the University of Wales, Swansea before graduating from Earlham College with a B.A.
Mat Johnson Family- Parents
Johnson was born and raised in the Germantown and Mount Airy communities in Philadelphia, the son of an African-American mother, while his father is Irish Catholic.
Mat Johnson Career
Johnson has previously taught at Rutgers University, Columbia University, Bard College, and The Callaloo Journal Writers Retreat. He was a teacher at the University of Houston’s Creative Writing Program. He is currently a lecturer in the University of Oregon’s Creative Writing Program. Johnson’s debut novel, Drop (2000), was a coming-of-age story about a self-hating Philadelphian who believes he has found an escape when he accepts a job at a Brixton-based advertising agency in London, UK. Johnson was recognized a “Writer on the Verge” by Interview magazine, and Drop was selected one of the “Best Novels of the Year” by Progressive Magazine.
Johnson published Hunting in Harlem (2003), a comedy about gentrification in Harlem and an examination of belief vs fanaticism. Hunting in Harlem received the Zora Neale Hurston/Richard Wright Legacy Award for Novel of the Year. Johnson made his first foray into comics with the five-issue limited series Hellblazer Special: Papa Midnite (Vertigo 2005), in which he took an existing character from the Hellblazer franchise and created an origin story that aimed to give depth and dignity to a character who was arguably a racial stereotype of the Noble Savage. The piece was set in 18th-century Manhattan and was based on Johnson’s research for his first historical work, The Great Negro Plot.
The Great Negro Plot is a work of creative nonfiction about the New York Slave Insurrection of 1741, as well as the subsequent trial and hysteria. Johnson’s graphic novel Incognegro, a noir mystery about death and the American South’s lynching history, was published by Vertigo Comics in February 2008. Warren Pleece, a British artist, illustrated the text, and Stephen John Phillips created the cover artwork. From 2006 to 2007, Johnson maintained the blog Niggerati Manor, which addressed African American literature and culture.
Mat Johnson Awards
Johnson was selected a 2007 USA. James Baldwin Fellow and received a $50,000 grant from United States Artists, a public nonprofit that supports and promotes the work of American artists. On September 21, 2011, Johnson received the Dos Passos Literature Prize for his work on American themes and the human experience.
Mat Johnson Books
- Drop (Bloomsbury USA, 2000)
- Hunting in Harlem (Bloomsbury USA, 2003)
- Pym (Random/Spiegel & Grau, 2011)
- Loving Day (Spiegel & Grau, 2015)
- Invisible Things (One World, 2022)
Mat Johnson Net Worth
He has an estimated net worth of 500 thousand dollars.