Editing Susan Sontag

{{Short description|American writer, critic and public intellectual (1933–2004)}}
{{Use American English|date=December 2024}}
{{Use mdy dates|date=December 2024}}
{{Infobox person
| name = Susan Sontag
| image = Susan Sontag 1979 ©Lynn Gilbert (headshot).jpg
| caption = Sontag in 1979
| birth_name = Susan Lee Rosenblatt
| birth_date = {{Birth date|1933|1|16|mf=y}}
| birth_place = New York City, U.S.
| death_date = {{Death date and age|2004|12|28|1933|1|16|mf=y}}
| death_place = New York City, U.S.
| resting_place = [[Montparnasse Cemetery]], Paris, France
| other_names =
| occupation = {{flatlist|
* [[Essay]]ist
* [[novel]]ist
* [[film director|filmmaker]]}}
| years_active = 1959–2004
| notable_works = {{plainlist|
*''[[Against Interpretation]]'' (1966)
*''[[On Photography]]'' (1977)
*''[[Illness as Metaphor]]'' (1978)
*''[[Regarding the Pain of Others]]'' (2003)}}
| spouse = {{marriage|[[Philip Rieff]]|1950|1959|end=div}}<ref name="Guardian fiction"/>
| partner = [[Annie Leibovitz]] (1989–2004)
| children = [[David Rieff]]
| education = [[University of California, Berkeley]]<br /> [[University of Chicago]] ([[Bachelor of Arts|BA]])<br />[[Harvard University]] ([[Master of Arts|MA]])
| website = {{Official URL}}
}}
'''Susan Lee Sontag''' ({{IPAc-en|ˈ|s|ɒ|n|t|æ|ɡ}}; January 16, 1933 – December 28, 2004) was an American writer, [[critic]], and [[public intellectual]]. She mostly wrote essays, but also published novels; she published her first major work, the essay "[[Notes on "Camp"|Notes on 'Camp']]{{Half-space}}", in 1964. Her best-known works include the critical works ''[[Against Interpretation]]'' (1966), ''[[On Photography]]'' (1977), ''[[Illness as Metaphor]]'' (1978) and ''[[Regarding the Pain of Others]]'' (2003), the short story "[[The Way We Live Now (short story)|The Way We Live Now]]" (1986) and the novels ''[[The Volcano Lover]]'' (1992) and ''[[In America (novel)|In America]]'' (1999).

Sontag was active in writing and speaking about, or traveling to, areas of conflict, including during the [[Vietnam War]] and the [[Siege of Sarajevo]]. She wrote extensively about literature, cinema, photography and media, illness, war, [[human rights]], and [[left-wing politics]]. Her essays and speeches drew backlash and controversy,<ref>{{cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=Qc63EF-mVukC&q=%22hooking+up%22+Tom+Wolfe|title=Hooking Up|isbn=978-0374103828|last1=Wolfe|first1=Tom|date=October 31, 2000|publisher=Macmillan}}</ref> and she has been called "one of the most influential critics of her generation".<ref>[http://www.nybooks.com/contributors/susan-sontag/ "Susan Sontag"], ''The New York Review of Books'', accessed December 19, 2012</ref>

==Early life and education==
Sontag was born '''Susan Rosenblatt''' in [[New York City]], the daughter of Mildred (née Jacobson) and Jack Rosenblatt, both [[Jewish|Jews]] of [[Lithuanian Jews|Lithuanian]]<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.dw.de/susan-sontag-receives-german-peace-prize-criticizes-us/a-994715|title=Susan Sontag Receives German Peace Prize, Criticizes U.S.|work=DW.COM}}</ref> and [[Polish Jews|Polish]] descent. Her father managed a fur trading business in China, where he died of [[tuberculosis]] in 1939, when Susan was five years old.<ref name="Guardian fiction">{{Cite news |url= https://www.theguardian.com/books/2000/may/27/fiction.features|title=Finding fact from fiction|last=Mackenzie|first=Suzie|date=May 27, 2000|work=The Guardian|access-date=December 14, 2017|language=en-GB| issn= 0261-3077}}</ref> Seven years later, Sontag's mother married US Army Captain Nathan Sontag. Susan and her sister, Judith, took their stepfather's surname, although he did not adopt them formally.<ref name= "Guardian fiction" /> Sontag did not have a religious upbringing and said she had not entered a [[synagogue]] until her mid-20s.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://jwa.org/encyclopedia/article/sontag-susan |title=Susan Sontag |publisher= Jewish Women's Archive | website=JWA.org |access-date=June 13, 2012}}</ref>

Remembering an unhappy childhood, with a cold, alcoholic, distant mother who was "always away", Sontag lived on [[Long Island]], New York,<ref name="Guardian fiction" /> then in [[Tucson, Arizona]], and later in the [[San Fernando Valley]] in [[southern California]], where she took refuge in books and graduated from [[North Hollywood High School]] at the age of 15. She began her undergraduate studies at the [[University of California, Berkeley]] but transferred to the [[University of Chicago]] in admiration of its prominent [[Core curriculum#Core curriculum|core curriculum]]. At Chicago, she undertook studies in [[philosophy]], ancient history, and literature alongside her other requirements. [[Leo Strauss]], Joseph Schwab, Christian Mackauer, [[Richard McKeon]], [[Peter von Blanckenhagen]], and [[Kenneth Burke]] were among her lecturers. She graduated at age 18 with an [[A.B.]] and was elected to [[Phi Beta Kappa]].<ref>"A Gluttonous Reader", Interview with M. McQuade in ''Poague'', pp. 271–278.</ref> While at Chicago, she became best friends with fellow student [[Mike Nichols]].<ref name="Turow">{{cite news|last=Turow|first=Scott|title=A Time When Things Started in Chicago |url= https://www.nytimes.com/2013/05/17/books/the-third-coast-a-history-of-chicago-by-thomas-dyja.html?_r=0|access-date=May 19, 2013| newspaper=The New York Times |date=May 16, 2013}}</ref> In 1951, her work appeared in print for the first time in the winter issue of the ''[[Chicago Review]]''.<ref>{{Cite journal |last=Sontag|first=Susan|date=1951| title=Review of The Plenipotentiaries |jstor=25292888| journal=Chicago Review| volume=5 |issue=1| pages=49–50| doi= 10.2307/25292888}}</ref>

At 17, Sontag married writer [[Philip Rieff]], a sociology instructor at the University of Chicago, after a 10-day courtship; their marriage lasted eight years.<ref>Sontag, Susan. ''Reborn: Journals and Notebooks 1947–1963'', ed. D. Rieff, Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2008, p. 144.</ref> While studying at Chicago, Sontag attended a summer school taught by the sociologist {{ill|Hans Heinrich Gerth|de}} who became a friend and subsequently influenced her study of German thinkers.<ref>{{cite AV media|url=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zXJe3EcPo1g| archive-url=https://ghostarchive.org/varchive/youtube/20211107/zXJe3EcPo1g| archive-date=November 7, 2021 | url-status=live| title=Susan Sontag: Public Intellectual, Polymath, Provocatrice|date=July 7, 2008|via=YouTube}}{{cbignore}}</ref><ref>{{Cite book|title=With a Critical Eye: An Intellectual and His Times| last=Vidich| first=Arthur J.| publisher= Newfound Press| year=2009|isbn=978-0979729249 |location= Knoxville, Tennessee |page=370|chapter=First Years at The New School|chapter-url= https://newfoundpress.utk.edu/pubs/vidich/chp10.pdf|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20131225121907/https://newfoundpress.utk.edu/pubs/vidich/chp10.pdf|archive-date=December 25, 2013}}</ref> Upon completing her Chicago degree, Sontag taught freshman English at the [[University of Connecticut]] for the 1952–53 academic year. She attended [[Harvard University]] for graduate school, initially studying literature with [[Perry Miller]] and [[Harry Levin]] before moving into philosophy and [[theology]] under [[Paul Tillich]], [[Jacob Taubes]], [[Raphael Demos]], and [[Morton White]].<ref>See Susan Sontag, 'Literature is Freedom' in ''At the Same Time'', ed. P. Dilonardo and A. Jump, Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2007, p.206 and Morton White, ''A Philosopher's Story'', Pennsylvania University Press, 1999, p. 148. See also Rollyson and Paddock, pp. 39–40 and Daniel Horowitz "Consuming Pleasures: Intellectuals and Popular Culture in the Postwar World", University of Pennsylvania, 2012, p. 314.</ref>

After completing her [[Master of Arts]] in philosophy, Sontag began doctoral research in metaphysics, ethics, Greek philosophy, Continental philosophy, and theology at Harvard.<ref>{{cite web| url= https://www.thefreelibrary.com/Putting+her+body+on+the+line%3A+the+critical+acts+of+Susan+Sontag%2C+Part...-a0172833464|title=Putting her body on the line: the critical acts of Susan Sontag, Part I.}}</ref> The philosopher [[Herbert Marcuse]] lived with Sontag and Rieff for a year while working on his 1955 book ''[[Eros and Civilization]]''.<ref name="rollyson-paddock">Rollyson and Paddock.</ref>{{rp|38}} Sontag researched for Rieff's 1959 study ''[[Freud: The Mind of the Moralist]]'' before their divorce in 1958, and contributed to the book to such an extent that she has been considered an unofficial co-author.<ref>{{cite book|last1=Rollyson|first1=Carl|last2=Paddock|first2=Lisa|title=Susan Sontag: The Making of Icon|date=2000|publisher=W. W. Norton & Company|location=New York|isbn=0-393-04928-0|pages=[https://archive.org/details/susansontagmakin00roll/page/40 40–41] |url=https://archive.org/details/susansontagmakin00roll/page/40}}</ref> The couple had a son, [[David Rieff]], who went on to be his mother's editor at [[Farrar, Straus and Giroux]], as well as a writer in his own right. According to Sontag's [[Sontag: Her Life and Work|biographer]] [[Benjamin Moser]], Sontag was the true author of the text on Freud, which she wrote after David's birth, and in the separation the latter was the subject of an exchange: she handed over the authorship of the book to Rieff, he gave her their son.<ref name="Freud1">{{Cite news |title=Susan Sontag was true author of ex-husband's book, biography claims  |url=https://www.theguardian.com/books/2019/may/13/susan-sontag-her-life-benjamin-moser-freud-the-mind-of-the-moralist-philip-rieff |work=The Guardian |date=May 13, 2019 |last=Flood |first=Alison |access-date=October 27, 2023}}</ref>

Sontag was awarded an [[American Association of University Women]]'s fellowship for the 1957–58 academic year to [[St Anne's College, Oxford]], where she traveled without her husband and son.<ref name="Sante">Sante, Luc. [https://www.nytimes.com/2009/02/01/books/review/Sante-t.html?_r=0 "Sontag: The Precocious Years"], Sunday Book Review, ''The New York Times'', January 29, 2009, accessed December 19, 2012</ref> There, she had classes with [[Iris Murdoch]], [[Stuart Hampshire]], [[A. J. Ayer]], and [[H. L. A. Hart]] while also attending the [[Bachelor of Philosophy|B. Phil]] seminars of [[J. L. Austin]] and the lectures of [[Isaiah Berlin]]. But Oxford did not appeal to her, and she transferred after [[Michaelmas]] term of 1957 to the [[University of Paris]] (the [[University of Paris|Sorbonne]]).<ref>See Morton White, ''A Philosopher's Story'', Pennsylvania University Press, 1999, p.148; and Rollyson and Paddock, pp. 43–45</ref> In [[Paris]], Sontag socialized with expatriate artists and academics including [[Allan Bloom]], [[Jean Wahl]], [[Alfred Chester]], [[Harriet Sohmers]], and [[María Irene Fornés]].<ref>[[Edward Field (poet)|Field, Edward]]. ''The Man Who Would Marry Susan Sontag'', Wisconsin, 2005, pp. 158–170; Rollyson and Paddock, pp. 45–50; and ''Reborn: Journals and Notebooks 1947–1963'', ed. D. Rieff, Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2008, pp. 188–189.</ref> She remarked that her time in Paris was perhaps the most important period of her life.<ref name="rollyson-paddock" />{{rp|51–52}} It certainly provided the basis of her long intellectual and artistic association with the [[culture of France]].<ref>"An Emigrant of Thought", interview with Jean-Louis Servan-Schreiber, in Poague, pp. 143–164</ref> She moved to New York in 1959 to live with Fornés for the next seven years,<ref>{{cite news| last= Moore| first= Patrick| url= https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-2005-jan-04-oe-moore4-story.html |title= Susan Sontag and a Case of Curious Silence| work= Los Angeles Times| date= January 4, 2005| access-date= December 18, 2012}}</ref> regaining custody of her son<ref name="Sante" /> and teaching at several universities, including the [[City College of New York]], while her literary reputation grew.<ref name="rollyson-paddock" />{{rp|53–54}}

==Career==
===Fiction===
[[File:Susan Sontag (1966 author photo - Against Interpretation).jpg|thumb|Photo portrait of Sontag, 1966]]
While working on her stories, Sontag taught philosophy at [[Sarah Lawrence College]] and [[City University of New York]] and the philosophy of religion with [[Jacob Taubes]], [[Susan Taubes]], [[Theodor Gaster]], and [[Hans Jonas]], in the religion department at [[Columbia University]] from 1960 to 1964. She held a writing fellowship at [[Rutgers University]] in 1964–65 before ending her relationship with academia in favor of full-time freelance writing.<ref name="rollyson-paddock" />{{rp|56–57}}

At age 30, Sontag published an [[experimental novel]] called ''The Benefactor'' (1963), following it four years later with ''Death Kit'' (1967). Despite a relatively small output, Sontag thought of herself principally as a [[novelist]] and writer of fiction.{{Citation needed|date=June 2023}} Her short story "[[The Way We Live Now (short story)|The Way We Live Now]]" was published to great acclaim on November 24, 1986, in ''[[The New Yorker]]''. Written in an experimental narrative style, it remains a significant text on the [[AIDS epidemic]]. She achieved late popular success as a best-selling novelist with ''[[The Volcano Lover]]'' (1992). At age 67, Sontag published her final novel, ''[[In America (novel)|In America]]'' (2000). The last two novels were set in the past, which Sontag said gave her greater freedom to write in the [[Polyphony (literature)|polyphonic]] voice:

{{Blockquote
|text=In a print shop near the [[British Museum]], in London, I discovered the volcano prints from the book that [[William Hamilton (diplomat)|Sir William Hamilton]] did. My very first thought—I don't think I have ever said this publicly—was that I would propose to [[Franco Maria Ricci|FMR]] (a wonderful art magazine published in Italy which has beautiful art reproductions) that they reproduce the volcano prints and I write some text to accompany them. But then I started to adhere to the real story of Lord Hamilton and his wife, and I realized that if I would locate stories in the past, all sorts of inhibitions would drop away, and I could do epic, polyphonic things. I wouldn't just be inside somebody's head. So there was that novel, ''[[The Volcano Lover]]''.|sign=Sontag|source=writing in ''[[The Atlantic]]'' (April 13, 2000)<ref>{{cite web |url=https://www.theatlantic.com/past/docs/unbound/interviews/ba2000-04-13.htm |title=Susan Sontag—whose new novel, In America, has just been published—doesn't feel at home in New York, or anywhere else. And that's the way she likes it |date=April 13, 2000 |website=Atlantic Unbound, The Atlantic's online journal |publisher=[[The Atlantic]] |access-date=October 31, 2017}}</ref>}}
She wrote and directed four films and also wrote several plays, the most successful of which were ''Alice in Bed'' and ''Lady from the Sea''.{{citation needed|date=December 2012}}

[[File:Against Interpretation (1966 1st ed dust jacket cover).jpg|thumb|The cover of ''Against Interpretation'' (1966), which contains some of Sontag's best-known essays]]

===Nonfiction===
====High and low in mass culture====
{{see also|Notes on "Camp"}}

It was through her essays that Sontag gained early fame and notoriety. She frequently wrote about the intersection of [[high culture|high]] and [[low culture|low]] art and expanded the dichotomy concept of form and art in every medium. She elevated [[Camp (style)|camp]] to the status of recognition with her widely read 1964 essay "[[Notes on "Camp"|Notes on 'Camp']]{{Half-space}}", which accepted art as including common, absurd, and [[burlesque]] themes.

====The concept of photography image====
In 1977, Sontag published the series of essays ''[[On Photography]]''. These essays are an exploration of photographs as a collection of the world, mainly by travelers or tourists, and the way we experience it. In the essays, she outlined her theory of taking pictures as you travel:
<blockquote>
The method especially appeals to people handicapped by a ruthless work ethic—Germans, Japanese and Americans. Using a camera appeases the anxiety which the work driven feel about not working when they are on vacation and supposed to be having fun. They have something to do that is like a friendly imitation of work: they can take pictures. (p. 10)
</blockquote>

Sontag writes that the convenience of modern photography has created an overabundance of visual material, and "just about everything has been photographed".<ref name="on-photography">Sontag, Susan, "On Photography", 1977</ref>{{rp|3}} This has altered our expectations of what we have the right to view, want to view, or should view. 

====Ethic and the problem of norms====
Ethical intentions are key points for Sontag. In her book ''[[On Photography]]''<ref> Sontag, Susan, "On Photography", 1977 </ref> she writes of the connection of the photography with the idea of norm.<ref>[[Ekaterina Vasileva (art historian)|Vasilieva, E. V]]. (2014). [https://www.researchgate.net/publication/367635642_Vasilieva_E_V_2014_Susan_Sontag_on_photography_the_idea_of_beauty_and_the_problem_of_norm_Vestnik_of_Saint_Petersburg_University_Arts_43_64-80 Susan Sontag on photography: the idea of beauty and the problem of norm]. Vestnik of Saint Petersburg University. Arts, 4(3), 64-80.</ref> Discussing photographs of [[Diane Arbus]], Sontag writes on borders and landmarks of the photo program of beauty. Beauty is the ground of the photography program and at the same time one of the biggest conceptual questions of photography.<ref> Rouillé A. (2005). La Photographie, entre document et art contemporain. Paris: Gallimard.  704 p.</ref> The problem of identification of [[beauty]] and [[Unattractiveness|ugliness]] forms one more question—the idea of norm.<ref> Vasilieva, E. V. (2014). [https://www.researchgate.net/publication/367635642_Vasilieva_E_V_2014_Susan_Sontag_on_photography_the_idea_of_beauty_and_the_problem_of_norm_Vestnik_of_Saint_Petersburg_University_Arts_43_64-80 Susan Sontag on photography: the idea of beauty and the problem of norm]. Vestnik of Saint Petersburg University. Arts, 4(3), 64-80.</ref>

"In teaching us a new visual code, photographs alter and enlarge our notion of what is worth looking at and what we have the right to observe" and has changed our "viewing ethics".<ref name="on-photography" />{{rp|3}} 

====Photography: reality and truth====
According to Sontag, photographs have increased our access to knowledge and experiences of history and faraway places, but the images may replace direct experience and limit reality;<ref name="on-photography" />{{rp|10–24}} photography desensitizes its audience to horrific human experiences, and children are exposed to experiences before they are ready for them.<ref name="on-photography" />{{rp|20}}

Sontag continued to theorize about the role of photography in life in her essay "Looking at War: Photography's View of Devastation and Death", which appeared in the December 9, 2002, issue of ''[[The New Yorker]]''. There she concludes that the problem of our reliance on images and especially photographic images is not that "people remember through photographs but that they remember only the photographs ... that the photographic image eclipses other forms of understanding—and remembering. ... To remember is, more and more, not to recall a story but to be able to call up a picture" (p.&nbsp;94).

She became a role model for many feminists and aspiring female writers during the 1960s and 1970s.<ref name="rollyson-paddock" />

==Criticism==

===White civilization as a cancer===
Sontag drew acclaim and criticism for writing in 1967 in ''[[Partisan Review]]'':

{{Blockquote|If America ''is'' the culmination of Western white civilization, as everyone from the Left to the Right declares, then there must be something terribly wrong with Western white civilization. This is a painful truth; few of us want to go that far.... The truth is that Mozart, Pascal, Boolean algebra, Shakespeare, parliamentary government, Baroque churches, Newton, the emancipation of women, Kant, Marx, Balanchine ballets, ''et al'', don't redeem what this particular civilization has wrought upon the world. The white race ''is'' the cancer of human history; it is the white race and it alone—its ideologies and inventions—which eradicates autonomous civilizations wherever it spreads, which has upset the ecological balance of the planet, which now threatens the very existence of life itself.<ref name="Sontag 1967 57–8">{{Cite journal |last = Sontag |first = Susan |year = 1967 |title = What's Happening to America? (A Symposium) |url = http://hgar-pub1.bu.edu/web/partisan-review/search-collection/detail/326075 |journal = [[Partisan Review]] |volume = 34 |number = 1 |pages = 57–58 |url-status = dead |archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20180912075653/http://hgar-srv3.bu.edu/collections/partisan-review/search/detail?id=326075 |archive-date = September 12, 2018}}</ref>}}

According to journalist [[Mark M. Goldblatt]], Sontag later made a "sarcastic retraction, saying the line slanders cancer patients".<ref>{{cite web |url=https://spectator.org/49153_death-susan-sontag |title=Susan Sontag: Remembering an intellectual heroine. |first=Mark |last=Goldblatt |author-link=Mark Goldblatt |date=January 3, 2005 |work=[[The American Spectator]] |publisher=American Spectator Foundation |access-date=March 17, 2013}}</ref> [[Patrick J. Buchanan]] said: "Rewrite that sentence with 'Jewish race' in place of 'white race' and the passage would fit nicely into ''[[Mein Kampf]]''".<ref>Buchanan Patrick J. (2001). ''[[The Death of the West|The Death of the West: How Dying Populations and Immigrant Invasions Imperil Our Country and Civilization]]'', (New York: St. Matrin's Griffin), p 217, https://archive.org/details/deathofwesthowdy00buch_0/page/216/mode/2up?view=theater</ref> According to [[Eliot Weinberger]], "She came to regret that last phrase, and wrote a whole book against the use of illness as metaphor". But, he wrote, this did not lead to any "public curiosity about those who are not cancerously white", and "She may well have been the last unashamed Eurocentrist".<ref>{{Cite journal |last = Weinberger |first = Eliot |author-link = Eliot Weinberger |year = 2007 |title = Notes on Susan |url = https://www.nybooks.com/articles/2007/08/16/notes-on-susan/ |journal = [[The New York Review of Books]] |volume = 54 |number = 13 |pages = 27–29 |archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20160305193650/https://www.nybooks.com/articles/2007/08/16/notes-on-susan/ |access-date = March 27, 2014 |archive-date = March 5, 2016}}</ref>

===Allegations of plagiarism===
Ellen Lee accused Sontag of plagiarism after discovering at least 12 passages in ''[[In America (novel)|In America]]'' that were similar to or copied from passages in four other books about [[Helena Modjeska]] without attribution.<ref name="marsh_2007">Marsh B. (2007) ''Plagiarism: Alchemy and Remedy in Higher Education'', [[SUNY Press]].</ref><ref name="kort_2007">{{cite book|last =Kort|first = Carol |date =2007|title = A to Z of American Women Writers|publisher = Infobase Publishing|isbn=9781438107936|url = https://books.google.com/books?id=QyvXLgnTNpIC}}</ref> Sontag said of the passages, "All of us who deal with real characters in history transcribe and adopt original sources in the original domain. I've used these sources and I've completely transformed them. There's a larger argument to be made that all of literature is a series of references and allusions."<ref>Carvajal, Doreen. (May 27, 2002) [http://partners.nytimes.com/library/books/052700sontag-america.html "So Whose Words Are They? Susan Sontag Creates a Stir."] ''New York Times Book Review''.</ref>

In a 2007 letter to the editor of the ''Times Literary Supplement'', John Lavagnino identified an unattributed citation from [[Roland Barthes]]'s 1970 essay "S/Z" in Sontag's 2004 speech "At the Same Time: The Novelist and Moral Reasoning", delivered as the [[Nadine Gordimer]] Lecture in March 2004.<ref>{{Cite news|last=Lavagnino|first=John|date=April 20, 2004|title=Letters to the editor|work=Times Literary Supplement}}</ref> Further research led Lavagnino to identify several passages that appeared to have been taken without attribution from an essay on hypertext fiction by [[Laura Miller (writer)|Laura Miller]] published in the ''New York Times Book Review'' six years earlier''.''<ref>{{Cite news|last=Miller|first=Laura|date=March 15, 1998|title=www.claptrap.com|work=[[The New York Times]] Book Review}}</ref> Writing for the ''Observer'', Michael Calderone interviewed Sontag's publisher, who said, "This was a speech, not a formal essay", and that "Susan herself never prepared it for publication".<ref>{{Cite news|last=Calderone|first=Michael|date=May 9, 2007|title=Regarding the Writing of Others|work=The Observer|url=https://observer.com/2007/05/regarding-the-writing-of-others/|access-date=April 23, 2021}}</ref>

===On Communism===
At a New York pro-[[Solidarity (Polish trade union)|Solidarity]] rally in 1982, Sontag said that "people on the left", like herself, "have willingly or unwillingly told a lot of lies".{{r|times19820227}} She added that they:

{{blockquote|believed in, or at least applied, a double standard to the angelic language of Communism ... Communism is Fascism—successful Fascism, if you will. What we have called Fascism is, rather, the form of tyranny that can be overthrown—that has, largely, failed. I repeat: not only is Fascism (and overt military rule) the probable destiny of all Communist societies—especially when their populations are moved to revolt—but Communism is in itself a variant, the most successful variant, of Fascism. Fascism with a human face... Imagine, if you will, someone who read only the ''Reader's Digest'' between 1950 and 1970, and someone in the same period who read only ''The Nation'' or [t]he ''New Statesman''. Which reader would have been better informed about the realities of Communism? The answer, I think, should give us pause. Can it be that our enemies were right?{{r|times19820227}}|sign=|source=}}

Sontag's speech reportedly "drew boos and shouts from the audience". ''The Nation'' published her speech, excluding the passage contrasting the magazine with ''Reader's Digest''. Responses to her statement were varied. Some said that Sontag's sentiments had been held by many on the left for years, while others accused her of betraying "radical ideas".<ref name="times19820227">{{cite news|title=Susan Sontag Provokes Debate on Communism|url=https://www.nytimes.com/books/00/03/12/specials/sontag-communism.html|access-date=September 13, 2010|newspaper=The New York Times|date=February 27, 1982}}</ref>

===On the September 11 attacks===
Sontag was angrily criticized for what she wrote in the September 24, 2001, issue of ''[[The New Yorker]]'' about the immediate aftermath of [[9/11]].<ref>[http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2004/dec/29/20041229-122439-9356r/?page=all "Novelist, Radical Susan Sontag, 71, Dies in New York"], ''The Washington Times'', December 29, 2004, accessed December 19, 2012</ref> She called the attacks a "monstrous dose of reality" and criticized U.S. public officials and media commentators for trying to convince the American public that "everything is O.K." Specifically, she opposed the idea that the perpetrators were "cowards", a comment [[George W. Bush]] had made. Rather, she argued the country should see the terrorists' actions not as "a 'cowardly' attack on 'civilization' or 'liberty' or 'humanity' or 'the free world' but an attack on the world's self-proclaimed superpower, undertaken as a consequence of specific American alliances and actions."<ref name=nyorker>{{cite news|last=Sontag|first=Susan|title=The Talk of the Town|url=https://www.newyorker.com/archive/2001/09/24/010924ta_talk_wtc|access-date=February 27, 2013|newspaper=The New Yorker|date=September 24, 2001}}</ref>

===Criticism from other writers===
In a 2000 article for ''[[Harper's Magazine]]'''s that was later included in his book ''[[Hooking Up]]'', [[Tom Wolfe]] called Sontag "just another scribbler who spent her life signing up for protest meetings and lumbering to the podium encumbered by her prose style, which had a handicapped parking sticker valid at ''[[Partisan Review]]''."<ref>{{cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=Qc63EF-mVukC&q=%22hooking+up%22+tom+wolfe|title=Hooking Up|isbn=978-0374103828|last1=Wolfe|first1=Tom|date=October 31, 2000|publisher=Macmillan}}</ref>

In "Sontag, Bloody Sontag", an essay in her 1994 book ''Vamps & Tramps'', critic [[Camille Paglia]] describes her initial admiration of and subsequent disillusionment with Sontag.<ref name="Paglia#">{{cite book |last=Paglia |first=Camille |year=1994 |title=Vamps and Tramps: New Essays |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=f_LlAmt--pkC&pg=PA347 |location=New York |publisher=Vintage Books |pages=347–348 |isbn=978-0-679-75120-5}}</ref> She makes several criticisms, including [[Harold Bloom]]'s comment "Mere Sontagisme!" on Paglia's doctoral dissertation, and says that Sontag "had become synonymous with a shallow kind of hip posturing".<ref>{{cite book |last=Paglia |first=Camille |year=1994 |title=Vamps and Tramps: New Essays |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=f_LlAmt--pkC&pg=PA345 |location=New York |publisher=Vintage Books |page=345 |isbn=978-0-679-75120-5}}</ref> Paglia also recounts a visit by Sontag to [[Bennington College]], in which she arrived hours late and ignored the agreed-upon topic of the event.<ref>{{cite book |last=Paglia |first=Camille |year=1994 |title=Vamps and Tramps: New Essays |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=f_LlAmt--pkC&pg=PA349 |location=New York |publisher=Vintage Books |pages=349–350 |isbn=978-0-679-75120-5}}</ref>

{{blockquote|text=Sontag's cool self-exile was a disaster for the American women's movement. Only a woman of her prestige could have performed the necessary critique and debunking of the first instant-canon feminist screeds, such as those by [[Kate Millett]] or [[Sandra Gilbert]] and [[Susan Gubar]], whose middlebrow mediocrity crippled women's studies from the start ... No patriarchal villains held Sontag back; her failures are her own.|author=Camille Paglia<ref name="Paglia#"/>}}

Seemingly unaware of Sontag's choice to live in Sarajevo during the siege, in his book ''[[Skin in the Game (book)|Skin in the Game]]'', [[Nassim Nicholas Taleb]] criticizes Sontag and other people with extravagant lifestyles who nevertheless declare themselves "against the market system". Taleb assesses Sontag's shared New York mansion at $28 million, and writes that "it is immoral to be in opposition to the market system and not live (somewhere in Vermont or Northwestern Afghanistan) in a hut or cave isolated from it" and that it is even worse to "claim virtue without fully living with its direct consequences".<ref>{{cite book|first=Nassim Nicholas|last=Taleb|title=Skin in the Game: Hidden Asymmetries in Daily Life|publisher=Random House|year=2018|isbn=978-0-4252-8462-9|pages=183–184}}</ref><ref>{{cite news |last1=Taleb |first1=Nassim Nicholas |title=The Merchandising of Virtue |url=https://medium.com/incerto/the-merchandising-of-virtue-b548762658f0 |access-date=June 1, 2019 |work=Medium |date=May 27, 2017}}</ref>

==Activism==
Sontag became politically active in the 1960s, opposing the [[Vietnam War]].<ref name="rollyson-paddock">Rollyson and Paddock.</ref>{{rp|128–129}} In January 1968, she signed the "[[Writers and Editors War Tax Protest]]" pledge, vowing to refuse to pay a proposed 10% Vietnam War surtax.<ref>"Writers and Editors War Tax Protest" January 30, 1968 ''New York Post''.</ref> In May 1968, she visited Hanoi; afterward, she wrote favorably about North Vietnamese society in her essay ''Trip to Hanoi''.<ref name="rollyson-paddock">Rollyson and Paddock.</ref>{{rp|130–132}}

[[File:SarajevoSiege2.JPG|thumb|200px|right|The former Sarajevo newspaper building during the [[Siege of Sarajevo]], when Sontag lived in the city]]
During 1989 Sontag was the President of [[PEN American Center]], the main U.S. branch of the [[International PEN]] writers' organization. After Iranian leader [[Khomeini|Ayatollah Khomeini]] issued a ''[[fatwa]]'' death sentence against writer [[Salman Rushdie]] for blasphemy after the publication of his novel ''[[The Satanic Verses]]'' that year, Sontag's uncompromising support of Rushdie was crucial in rallying American writers to his cause.<ref>Hitchens, Christopher. [https://www.vanityfair.com/politics/features/2009/02/hitchens200902 "Assassins of the Mind"], ''Vanity Fair'', February 2009, accessed December 18, 2012</ref>

{{anchor|Waiting}}<!--I need this in another page-->A few years later, during the [[Siege of Sarajevo]], Sontag gained attention for directing a production of [[Samuel Beckett]]'s ''[[Waiting for Godot]]'' in a candlelit theater in the Bosnian capital, cut off from its electricity supply for three and a half years. The reaction of Sarajevo's besieged residents was noted:<blockquote>To the people of Sarajevo, Ms. Sontag has become a symbol, interviewed frequently by the local newspapers and television, invited to speak at gatherings everywhere, asked for autographs on the street. After the opening performance of the play, the city's Mayor, [[Muhamed Kreševljaković]], came onstage to declare her an honorary citizen, the only foreigner other than the recently departed United Nations commander, [[Philippe Morillon|Lieut. Gen. Phillippe Morillon]], to be so named. "It is for your bravery, in coming here, living here, and working with us," he said.<ref>{{cite news|first=John F.|last=Burns |url=https://www.nytimes.com/1993/08/19/world/to-sarajevo-writer-brings-good-will-and-godot.html |title=To Sarajevo, Writer Brings Good Will and 'Godot' |work=The New York Times |date= August 19, 1993|access-date=2014-02-25}}</ref></blockquote>

==Personal life==
Sontag's mother died of [[lung cancer]] in [[Hawaii]] in 1986.<ref name="Guardian fiction" />

Sontag died in New York City on December 28, 2004, aged 71, from complications of [[myelodysplastic syndrome]] which had evolved into [[acute myelogenous leukemia]]. She is buried in Paris at [[Montparnasse Cemetery|Cimetière du Montparnasse]].<ref>Wilson, Scott. ''Resting Places: The Burial Sites of More Than 14,000 Famous Persons'', 3d ed.: 2 (Kindle Location 44249). McFarland & Company, Inc., Publishers. Kindle Edition.</ref> Her final illness has been chronicled by her son, [[David Rieff]].<ref>{{cite news |url=https://www.nytimes.com/2008/02/03/books/review/Roiphe-t.html |title=Swimming in a Sea of Death: A Son's Memoir – David Rieff – Book Review |access-date=February 23, 2008 |first=Katie|last=Roiphe|author-link=Katie Roiphe | work=The New York Times | date=February 3, 2008}}</ref>

===Sexuality and relationships===
[[File:Susan Sontag by Juan Bastos.JPG|thumb|Susan Sontag in 1994, painted by [[Bolivia]]n artist [[Juan Fernando Bastos]]]]
Sontag became aware of her [[bisexuality]] during her early teens. At 15, she wrote in her diary, "I feel I have lesbian tendencies (how reluctantly I write this)." At 16, she had a sexual encounter with a woman: "Perhaps I was drunk, after all, because it was so beautiful when H began making love to me... It had been 4:00 before we had gotten to bed... I became fully conscious that I desired her, she knew it, too."<ref>[https://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/books/news/susan-sontag-it-was-so-beautiful-when-h-began-making-love-to-me-1020497.html Susan Sontag: 'It was so beautiful when H began making love to me'], Paul Bignell, ''The Independent on Sunday'', November 16, 2008</ref><ref>''Reborn: Early Diaries, 1947–1964'', Penguin, January 2009</ref>

Sontag lived with 'H', the writer and model [[Harriet Sohmers Zwerling]], whom she first met at [[U. C. Berkeley]] from 1958 to 1959. Later, Sontag was the partner of [[María Irene Fornés]], a Cuban-American [[avant garde]] playwright and director. Upon splitting with Fornés, she was involved with an Italian aristocrat, Carlotta Del Pezzo, and the German academic [[Eva Kollisch]].<ref>See Susan Sontag, ''As Consciousness is Harnessed to Flesh'', p.262, 269.</ref> Sontag was romantically involved with the American artists [[Jasper Johns]] and [[Paul Thek]].<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.full-stop.net/2012/04/09/features/essays/luban/the-passion-of-susan-sontag/|title=The Passion of Susan Sontag|website=full-stop.net|first=Rachel|last=Luban|date=April 9, 2012|access-date=November 8, 2022}}</ref><ref>Paul Thek ''Artist's Artist'' ed. H. Falckenberg.</ref> During the early 1970s, she lived with [[Nicole Stéphane]], a [[Rothschild family|Rothschild]] banking heiress turned movie actress,<ref>Leo Lerman, "The Grand Surprise: The Journals of Leo Lerman", NY: Knopf, 2007, page 413</ref> and, later, the choreographer [[Lucinda Childs]].<ref name=nytm>{{cite news |url=https://www.nytimes.com/2006/09/10/magazine/10sontag.html?_r=1&oref=slogin&pagewanted=all |title=On Self |access-date=February 23, 2008 |first=Susan|last=Sontag |work=The New York Times Magazine |date=September 10, 2006}}</ref> Sontag also had a relationship with the writer [[Joseph Brodsky]], who deepened her appreciation of the [[anti-communism]] of the writers persecuted by the Soviet regime, whom she had read and in some cases even known, without really understanding them.<ref>See Sigrid Nunez, ''Sempre Susan: A Memoir of Susan Sontag'', p. 31.</ref> 

With photographer [[Annie Leibovitz]], Sontag maintained a close romantic relationship stretching from the later 1980s until her final years.<ref name=McGuigan>McGuigan, Cathleen. "Through Her Lens", ''Newsweek'', October 2, 2006</ref> Sontag and Leibovitz met in 1989, when both had already established notability in their careers. Leibovitz has suggested that Sontag mentored her and constructively criticized her work. During Sontag's lifetime, neither woman publicly disclosed whether the relationship was a friendship or romantic. ''[[Newsweek]]'' in 2006 made reference to Leibovitz's decade-plus relationship with Sontag: "The two first met in the late '80s, when Leibovitz photographed her for a book jacket. They never lived together, though they each had an apartment within view of the other's."<ref>{{cite news | author=Cathleen McGuigan | title=Through Her Lens | url=http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/14964292/site/newsweek | work=Newsweek | date=October 2, 2006 | access-date=July 19, 2007 | url-status=dead |archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20070829133058/http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/14964292/site/newsweek/ <!-- Bot retrieved archive --> |archive-date = August 29, 2007}}</ref>

When interviewed for her 2006 book ''A Photographer's Life: 1990–2005'', Leibovitz said the book told a number of stories, and that "with Susan, it was a love story."<ref>{{cite news | first=Janny|last=Scott | title=From Annie Leibovitz: Life, and Death, Examined | url=https://www.nytimes.com/2006/10/06/arts/design/06leib.html?pagewanted=3&_r=1 | work=[[The New York Times]] | date=October 6, 2006 | access-date=July 19, 2007}}</ref> While ''The New York Times'' in 2009 referred to Sontag as Leibovitz's "companion",<ref name="nyt-july2009">{{cite news | url = https://www.nytimes.com/2009/08/02/fashion/02annie.html?pagewanted=all | first= Allen | last= Salkin | title=For Annie Leibovitz, a Fuzzy Financial Picture | work =[[The New York Times]] | date=July 31, 2009 | access-date= June 17, 2014}}</ref> Leibovitz wrote in ''A Photographer's Life'', "Words like 'companion' and 'partner' were not in our vocabulary. We were two people who helped each other through our lives. The closest word is still 'friend.{{'"}}<ref>{{cite web|last=Brockes|first=Emma|title=My time with Susan|date=November 17, 2011|url=http://losarciniegas.blogspot.com/2011/11/annie-leibovitz-my-time-with-susan.html|access-date=April 17, 2013}}</ref> The same year, Leibovitz said the descriptor "lover" was accurate.<ref>{{cite web | author=Tom Ashbrook | url=http://www.onpointradio.org/shows/2006/10/20061017_b_main.asp | title=On Point | date=October 17, 2006 | access-date=July 19, 2007| archive-url= https://web.archive.org/web/20070710211653/http://www.onpointradio.org/shows/2006/10/20061017_b_main.asp| archive-date= July 10, 2007 | url-status= live}}</ref> She later reiterated, "Call us 'lovers.' I like 'lovers.' You know, 'lovers' sounds romantic. I mean, I want to be perfectly clear. I love Susan."<ref name="sfgate">{{cite news | first=Edward | last = Guthmann | title=Love, family, celebrity, grief – Leibovitz puts her life on display in photo memoir | url=http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2006/11/01/DDGCKM2T9J1.DTL | work=[[The San Francisco Chronicle]] | date=November 1, 2006 | access-date=July 19, 2007}}</ref>

In an interview in ''[[The Guardian]]'' in 2000, Sontag was open about bisexuality:
{{blockquote|'Shall I tell you about getting older?', she says, and she is laughing. 'When you get older, 45 plus, men stop fancying you. Or put it another way, the men I fancy don't fancy me. I want a young man. I love beauty. So what's new?' She says she has been in love seven times in her life. 'No, hang on,' she says. 'Actually, it's nine. Five women, four men.'<ref name="Guardian fiction"/>}}

Many of Sontag's obituaries failed to mention her significant same-sex relationships, most notably that with Leibovitz. [[Daniel Okrent]], [[public editor]] of ''[[The New York Times]],'' defended the newspaper's obituary, saying that at the time of Sontag's death, a reporter could make no independent verification of her romantic relationship with Leibovitz (despite attempts to do so).<ref>{{cite news|url=http://www.nypress.com/article-10920-gay-abe-sapphic-susan.html| title=Gay Abe, Sapphic Susan; On the difficulties of outing the dead.| author=Michelangelo Signorile| publisher=New York Press}}</ref> After Sontag's death, ''Newsweek'' published an article about Leibovitz that made clear references to her relationship with Sontag.<ref name=McGuigan/>

Sontag was quoted by editor-in-chief Brendan Lemon of ''[[Out Magazine|Out]]'' magazine as saying "I grew up in a time when the modus operandi was the 'open secret.' I'm used to that, and quite OK with it. Intellectually, I know why I haven't spoken more about my sexuality, but I do wonder if I haven't repressed something there to my detriment. Maybe I could have given comfort to some people if I had dealt with the subject of my private sexuality more, but it's never been my prime mission to give comfort, unless somebody's in drastic need. I'd rather give pleasure, or shake things up."<ref>{{Cite news|url=https://www.out.com/entertainment/2005/01/05/why-sontag-didnt-want-come-out-her-words|title=Why Sontag Didn't Want to Come Out: Her Words|last=Lemon|first=Brendan|date=January 5, 2005|work=Out|access-date=February 2, 2018|language=en}}</ref>

==Legacy==
Following Sontag's death, Steve Wasserman of the ''[[Los Angeles Times]]'' called her "one of America's most influential intellectuals, internationally renowned for the passionate engagement and breadth of her critical intelligence and her ardent activism in the cause of human rights."<ref>{{cite news |last1=Wasserman |first1=Steve |title=Author Susan Sontag Dies |url=https://www.latimes.com/local/obituaries/la-122804sontag_lat-story.html |newspaper=Los Angeles Times|date=December 28, 2004 |access-date=October 20, 2020}}</ref> Eric Homberger of ''[[The Guardian]]'' called Sontag "the 'Dark Lady' of American cultural life for over four decades."<ref name="guard"/> He observed that "despite a brimming and tartly phrased political sensibility, she was fundamentally an aesthete [who] offered a reorientation of American cultural horizons."<ref name="guard">{{cite web |last1=Homberger |first1=Eric |title=Susan Sontag obituary |url=https://www.theguardian.com/news/2004/dec/29/guardianobituaries.booksobituaries |website=The Guardian |date=December 29, 2004 |access-date=October 20, 2020}}</ref>

Of ''[[Against Interpretation]]'', Brandon Robshaw of ''[[The Independent]]'' later wrote that "Sontag was remarkably prescient; her project of analysing popular culture as well as high culture, the Doors as well as Dostoevsky, is now common practice throughout the educated world."<ref>{{cite web |last=Robshaw |first=Brandon |title=Against Interpretation, By Susan Sontag |work=[[The Independent]] |date=September 26, 2009 |url=https://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/books/reviews/against-interpretation-by-susan-sontag-1792577.html |archive-url=https://ghostarchive.org/archive/20220525/https://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/books/reviews/against-interpretation-by-susan-sontag-1792577.html |archive-date=May 25, 2022 |url-access=subscription |url-status=live |access-date=April 14, 2016}}</ref> In ''Critique and Postcritique'' (2017), [[Rita Felski]] and Elizabeth S. Anker argue that the title essay from the aforementioned collection played an important role in the field of [[postcritique]], a movement within [[literary criticism]] and [[cultural studies]] that attempts to find new forms of reading and interpretation that go beyond the methods of [[critique]], [[critical theory]], and [[ideological criticism]].<ref name=":0">{{Cite book|title=Critique and Postcritique|last=Elizabeth S. Anker, Rita Felski|publisher=Duke University Press|year=2017|isbn=978-0-8223-6376-7|location=Chapel Hill|pages=16}}</ref>

Reviewing Sontag's ''[[On Photography]]'' in 1998, Michael Starenko wrote that it "has become so deeply absorbed into this discourse that Sontag's claims about photography, as well as her mode of argument, have become part of the rhetorical 'tool kit' that photography theorists and critics carry around in their heads."<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.thefreelibrary.com/Focus+on+Photography.-a0179492704 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20151001013318/http://www.thefreelibrary.com/Focus+on+Photography.-a0179492704 |url-status=dead |archive-date=October 1, 2015 |access-date=September 30, 2015 |title=Focus on Photography – Free Online Library}}</ref>

== Awards and honors ==
* 1976: [[American Academy of Arts and Letters|Arts and Letters Award in Literature]]<ref>{{Cite web |date= |title=Susan Sontag |url=https://artsandletters.org/?s=susan+sontag&restype=all |access-date= |website=artsandletters.org |publisher=American Academy of Arts and Literature}}</ref> 
* 1977: [[National Book Critics Circle Award]] for ''On Photography''<ref>{{Cite web |title=1977 Winners & Finalists |url=https://www.bookcritics.org/past-awards/1977/ |access-date=December 25, 2020 |website=bookcritics.org |publisher=National Book Critics Circle}}</ref>
* 1979: Became member of the American Arts
* 1990: [[MacArthur Fellows Program|MacArthur Fellowship]]<ref name="Fellows90">{{cite web |title=Meet the 1990 MacArthur Fellows |url=http://www.macfound.org/fellows/class/august-1990/ |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20131004230125/http://www.macfound.org/fellows/class/august-1990/ |archive-date=October 4, 2013 |access-date=July 1, 2013 |website=macfound.org |publisher=[[The John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation]]}}</ref>
* 1992: [[Premio Malaparte|Malaparte Prize]], Italy<ref name="Rollyson2016">{{cite book |last=Rollyson |first=Carl |title=Understanding Susan Sontag |publisher=University of South Carolina Press |year=2016 |series=Understanding Contemporary American Literature |pages=110–112 |doi=10.2307/j.ctv6sj92n |s2cid=185707026}}</ref>
* 1999: [[Commandeur des Arts et des Lettres]], France<ref name="Rollyson2016" />
* 2000: [[National Book Award]] for ''In America''<ref name="nba2000">[https://www.nationalbook.org/awards-prizes/national-book-awards-2000 "National Book Awards – 2000"], [[National Book Foundation]], with essays by Jessica Hicks and Elizabeth Yale from the Awards' 60-year anniversary blog, accessed March 3, 2012</ref>
* 2001: [[Jerusalem Prize]], awarded every two years to a writer whose work explores the freedom of the individual in society.<ref name="Rollyson2016" />
* 2002: [[George Polk Awards|George Polk Award]] for Cultural Criticism for "Looking at War", in ''The New Yorker''<ref name="Rollyson2016" />
* 2003: Honorary Doctorate of [[Tübingen University]]{{citation needed|date=December 2020}}
* 2003: [[Friedenspreis des Deutschen Buchhandels]] during the [[Frankfurt Book Fair]]<ref>{{Cite news |date=June 21, 2003 |title=Susan Sontag Wins German Peace Prize |url=https://www.dw.com/en/susan-sontag-wins-german-peace-prize/a-896760 |access-date=December 25, 2020 |work=Deustche Welle |language=en-GB}}</ref>
* 2003: [[Prince of Asturias Awards|Prince of Asturias Award on Literature]].<ref>{{cite web |title=Fatema Mernissi and Susan Sontag, Prince of Asturias Award for Literature 2003 |url=https://www.fpa.es/en/princess-of-asturias-awards/laureates/2003-fatema-mernissi-susan-sontag.html |access-date=November 9, 2019 |website=fpa.es |publisher=Prince of Asturias Foundation}}</ref>
* 2004: Two days after her death, Muhidin Hamamdzic, the mayor of [[Sarajevo]] announced the city would name a street after her, calling her an "author and a humanist who actively participated in the creation of the history of [[Sarajevo]] and [[Bosnia]]." Theatre Square outside the National Theatre was promptly proposed to be renamed Susan Sontag Theatre Square.<ref>{{cite web |title=Bosnians Honor Susan Sontag |url=http://www.accessmylibrary.com/article-1G1-127862631/bosnians-honour-susan-sontag.html |publisher=Gale |via=accessmylibrary.com}}</ref> It took five years, however, for that tribute to become official.<ref name="sarajevo.co.ba">{{cite web |date=January 14, 2010 |title=Sarajevo Theater Square officially renamed to Theater Square of Susan Sontag |url=http://sarajevo.co.ba/susan-sontag-konacno-na-pozorisnom-trgu/ |access-date= |website=sarajevo.co.ba |publisher=}}</ref><ref>{{cite news |last=Carter |first=Imogen |date=April 5, 2009 |title=Desperately thanking Susan |url=https://www.theguardian.com/stage/2009/apr/05/susan-sontag-godot-sarajevo-bosnia |access-date=January 30, 2015 |newspaper=[[The Observer]]}}</ref> On January 13, 2010, the city of Sarajevo posted a plate with a new street name for Theater Square: Theater Square of Susan Sontag.<ref name="sarajevo.co.ba" />
* 2024: A [[Sontag (crater)|crater]] on [[Mercury (planet)|Mercury]] was named in her honor in November 2024.<ref>{{cite web |url = http://planetarynames.wr.usgs.gov/Feature/16329 |title = Sontag |publisher = [[IAU]]/[[NASA]]/[[USGS]] |work = Gazetteer of Planetary Nomenclature |access-date = December 1, 2024}}</ref>

==Works==
===Fiction===
* {{cite book | last=Sontag | first=Susan | title=The Benefactor | publisher=Anchor Books | publication-place=New York, N.Y. | date=1991 | orig-date=1963 | isbn=978-0-385-26710-6}}
* {{cite book |first=Susan |last=Sontag |author-mask=2 |title=Death Kit |year=1967 |publisher=[[Farrar, Straus and Giroux]] |isbn=9780312420116}}
* {{cite book |first=Susan |last=Sontag |author-mask=2 |title=[[I, etcetera]] |year=1977 |publisher=Farrar, Straus and Giroux |others=Collection of short stories |isbn=9780374174026}}
* {{cite book |first=Susan |last=Sontag |author-mask=2 |title=[[The Way We Live Now (short story)|The Way We Live Now]] |year=1991 |publisher=[[Farrar, Straus and Giroux|Noonday Press]] |isbn=9780374523053}}
* {{cite book |first=Susan |last=Sontag |author-mask=2 |title=[[The Volcano Lover]] |year=1992 |publisher=[[Penguin Books]] |isbn=9781558008182}}
* {{cite book |first=Susan |last=Sontag |author-mask=2 |title=[[In America (novel)|In America]] |year=1999 |publisher=[[Random House|Random House Trade Paperbacks]] |isbn=9781568958989}}

===Plays===
* {{cite book |first=Susan |last=Sontag |author-mask=2 |title=A Parsifal |year=1991 |others=A deconstruction inspired by [[Robert Wilson (director)|Robert Wilson]]'s 1991 staging of the [[Richard Wagner|Wagner]] opera}}<ref>{{cite journal |last=Sontag |first=Susan |editor-last=Halpern |editor-first=Daniel |year=1991 |title=''A Parsifal'' |journal=[[Antaeus (magazine)|Antaeus]] |location=New York |pages=180–185 |publisher=[[Ecco Press]]}}</ref>
* {{cite book |first=Susan |last=Sontag |author-mask=2 |title=Alice in Bed |year=1993 |others=About 19th-century intellectual [[Alice James]], who was confined to bed by illness |publisher=[[Farrar, Straus and Giroux]] |location=New York |isbn=9780374102739}}<ref>{{cite book |year=1993 |title=Alice in Bed |last=Sontag |first=Susan |publisher=[[Farrar, Straus and Giroux]] |location=New York |isbn=9780374102739}}</ref>
* {{cite book |first=Susan |last=Sontag |author-mask=2 |title=Lady from the Sea |year=1998 |others=An adaptation of [[Henrik Ibsen]]'s [[The Lady from the Sea|1888 play of the same name]], premiered in Italy.}}<ref>Curty, Stefano. [http://www.playbill.com/news/article/38701-Sontag-and-Wilsons-Lady-from-the-Sea-World-Premieres-in-Italy-May-5 "Sontag and Wilson's ''Lady from the Sea'' World Premieres in Italy, May 5"] {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140729020809/http://www.playbill.com/news/article/38701-Sontag-and-Wilsons-Lady-from-the-Sea-World-Premieres-in-Italy-May-5 |date=July 29, 2014}}, Playbill, May 5, 1998, accessed December 26, 2012</ref><ref>{{cite journal |last=Sontag |first=Susan |date=Summer 1999 |title= Rewriting ''Lady from the Sea'' |journal=Theater |volume=29 |issue=1 |pages=89–91 |publisher=Duke University Press|doi=10.1215/01610775-29-1-88}}</ref>{{efn|Sontag wrote an essay about it in ''Theatre'' in 1999, titled "Rewriting ''Lady from the Sea''."}}

===Nonfiction===

==== Collections of essays ====
Sontag published numerous essays and reviews in ''[[The New York Review of Books]]'', ''[[Partisan Review]]'', ''[[The New Yorker]]'', ''[[Vanity Fair (magazine)|Vanity Fair]]'', ''[[Vogue (magazine)|Vogue]]'', ''[[The New York Times]]'', the ''[[Los Angeles Times]]'', ''[[The Times Literary Supplement]]'', ''[[The Nation]]'', ''[[The New Republic]]'', ''[[Art in America]]'', ''[[Granta]]'' and the ''[[London Review of Books]]''. Many of these were included in her collections.
* {{cite book |first=Susan |last=Sontag |author-mask=2 |title=[[Against Interpretation]] |year=1966 |isbn=9780385267083 |others=Includes "[[Notes on "Camp"]]" |publisher=Anchor Books }}
* {{cite book |first=Susan |last=Sontag |author-mask=2 |title=[[Styles of Radical Will]] |year=1969 |publisher=Macmillan |isbn=9780312420215}}
* {{cite book |first=Susan |last=Sontag |author-mask=2 |title=[[On Photography]] |year=1977 |publisher=Farrar, Straus and Giroux |isbn=9780374226268}}
* {{cite book |first=Susan |last=Sontag |author-mask=2 |title=[[Under the Sign of Saturn]] |year=1980 |publisher=Farrar, Straus & Giroux |isbn=9780374280765}}
* {{cite book |first=Susan |last=Sontag |author-mask=2 |title=[[Where the Stress Falls]] |year=2001 |publisher=Macmillan |isbn=9780374289171}}
* {{cite book |first=Susan |last=Sontag |author-mask=2 |title=[[At the Same Time|At the Same Time: Essays and Speeches]] |year=2007 |isbn=9780374100728 |others=Edited by Paolo Dilonardo and Anne Jump, with a foreword by [[David Rieff]]|publisher=Macmillan }}
* {{cite book |first=Susan |last=Sontag |author-mask=2 |title=[[On Women]] |year=2023 |isbn=9781250876867 |others=Edited by David Rieff, with an introduction by [[Merve Emre]]|publisher=Picador }}

====Monographs====
* {{cite book |first=Susan |last=Sontag |author-mask=2 |title=[[Freud: The Mind of the Moralist]] |year=1959 }} (Authorship disputed)<ref name="Freud1" />
* {{cite book |first=Susan |last=Sontag |author-mask=2 |title=[[Illness as Metaphor]] |year=1978 |publisher=Farrar, Straus and Giroux |isbn=9780394728445}}
* {{cite book |first=Susan |last=Sontag |author-mask=2 |title=[[AIDS and Its Metaphors]] |year=1988 |isbn=9780374102579 |others=A continuation of ''Illness as Metaphor''|publisher=Farrar, Straus and Giroux }}
* {{cite book |first=Susan |last=Sontag |author-mask=2 |title=[[Regarding the Pain of Others]] |year=2003 |publisher=Farrar, Straus and Giroux |isbn=9780374248581}}

===Films===
* (1969) ''[[Duet for Cannibals]]'' (''Duett för kannibaler'')
* (1971) ''[[Brother Carl]]'' (''Bröder Carl'')
* (1974) ''[[Promised Lands]]''
* (1983) ''Unguided Tour AKA Letter from Venice''

===Discography===
* (1979) ''Debriefing'' 
===Other works===
* {{cite book |first=Patti |last=Smith |author-mask=2 |title=[[Land (1975–2002)]] |year=2002 |publisher=Columbia Records |others=Liner notes by Susan Sontag}}
* {{cite book |last=Fischerspooner |author-mask=2 |title=[[Odyssey (Fischerspooner album)|Odyssey]] |year=2004 |publisher=EMI |others=Contribution of phrases by Susan Sontag}}
* {{cite book |first=Susan |last=Sontag |author-mask=2 |title=Reborn: Journals and Notebooks 1947–1963 |year=2008 |publisher=[[Farrar, Straus and Giroux]] |location=New York |isbn=9780312428501 |others=Edited by [[David Rieff]]}}
* {{cite book |first=Susan |last=Sontag |author-mask=2 |title=As Consciousness Is Harnessed to Flesh: Journals and Notebooks, 1964–1980 |year=2012 |publisher=[[Farrar, Straus and Giroux]] |location=New York |isbn=9780374100766 |others=Edited by [[David Rieff]]}}

==Digital archive==
A digital archive of 17,198 of Sontag's emails is kept by the [[University of California, Los Angeles|UCLA]] Department of Special Collections at the [[Charles E. Young Research Library]].<ref>{{cite magazine|url=https://www.newyorker.com/books/page-turner/in-the-sontag-archives|title=In the Sontag Archives|author=Moser, Benjamin|author-link=Benjamin Moser|magazine=[[The New Yorker]]|date=January 30, 2014|access-date=September 23, 2020}}</ref> Her archive—and the efforts to make it publicly available while protecting it from [[data rot|bit rot]]—are the subject of the article ''On Excess: Susan Sontag's Born-Digital Archive'', by Jeremy Schmidt and Jacquelyn Ardam.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://lareviewofbooks.org/essay/excess-susan-sontags-born-digital-archive|title=On Excess: Susan Sontag's Born-Digital Archive|first1=Jeremy|last1=Schmidt|first2=Jacquelyn|last2=Ardam|work=[[Los Angeles Review of Books]]|date=October 26, 2014|access-date=September 23, 2020}}</ref>

==Biographical play, documentary, and biopic film ==
''Sontag: Reborn'' is a play dramatizing Sontag's life as recorded in her early journals (which were later edited and published as the book ''Reborn''). Described as "a spellbinding X-ray of a writer’s psyche",<ref>{{cite news |last1=Isherwood |first1=Charles |title=On Genius: Developing a Life of Intellect |url=https://www.nytimes.com/2013/06/07/theater/reviews/sontag-reborn-at-new-york-theater-workshop.html |agency=New York Times Theatre Review |publisher=New York Times |date=June 6, 2013}}</ref> ''Sontag: Reborn'' traces Sontag's private life from age 14 to her emergence as a renowned author and activist. The young Sontag wrestles with her emerging sexuality and precocious intelligence. The refuge of her diary became integral to her development as a writer.<ref>{{cite web |title=Sontag: Reborn |url=https://thebuildersassociation.org/shows/sontag-reborn/ |website=The Builders Association}}</ref> The play was adapted from Sontag's journals by theatre artist [[Moe Angelos]], who also plays Sontag in the production, directed by [[Marianne Weems]], and produced by [[The Builders Association]]. ''Sontag: Reborn'' was first staged at the Under the Radar Festival in 2012,<ref>{{cite web |last1=Grogan |first1=Molly |title=Sontag: Reborn |url=https://exeuntmagazine.com/reviews/sontag-reborn/ |publisher=Exeunt Magazine}}</ref> moved to off-Broadway at New York Theatre Workshop in 2013, and was staged into 2014. 

A documentary about Sontag directed by [[Nancy Kates]], ''[[Regarding Susan Sontag]]'', was released in 2014.<ref name="Los Angeles Times">{{cite web|url=https://www.latimes.com/entertainment/la-et-st-hbo-sontag-20141208-column.html|title='Regarding Susan Sontag' looks at a rock star of intellectuals|author=Lloyd, Robert|date=December 8, 2014|work=Los Angeles Times|access-date=September 23, 2020}}</ref> It received the Special Jury Mention for Best Documentary Feature at the 2014 [[Tribeca Festival]].<ref name="Los Angeles Times"/><ref>{{cite news|title=Here Are Your TFF 2014 Award Winners|url=http://tribecafilm.com/stories/here-are-your-tff-2014-award-winners|access-date=August 31, 2014|date=April 24, 2014|archive-date=August 27, 2019|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190827201503/http://www.tribecafilm.com/stories/here-are-your-tff-2014-award-winners|url-status=dead}}</ref>

In February 2023, ''[[Screen International|Screen]]'' reported that [[Brouhaha Entertainment]] was producing a [[biographical film]] directed by [[Kirsten Johnson]] and featuring [[Kristen Stewart]] as Sontag. It is based on [[Benjamin Moser]]'s biography ''[[Sontag: Her Life and Work]]''.<ref>{{Cite web |last=Tabbara |first=Mona |title=Kristen Stewart to star as influential US writer Susan Sontag in Brouhaha Entertainment feature (exclusive) |url=https://www.screendaily.com/news/kristen-stewart-to-star-as-influential-us-writer-susan-sontag-in-brouhaha-entertainment-feature-exclusive/5179023.article |access-date=February 10, 2023 |website=[[Screen Daily]]}}</ref>

== See also ==
* [[LGBTQ culture in New York City]]
* [[List of LGBTQ people from New York City]]

== Notes ==
{{notelist}}

== References ==
{{reflist}}

=== Additional general references, not in-line ===
* {{cite web |last1=Flood|first1=Alison |url = https://www.theguardian.com/books/2019/may/13/susan-sontag-her-life-benjamin-moser-freud-the-mind-of-the-moralist-philip-rieff | title = Susan Sontag was true author of ex-husband's book, biography claims |date=May 13, 2019 |work=[[The Guardian]] |access-date = May 14, 2019}}
* Poague, Leland, ed. (1995). ''Conversations with Susan Sontag''. University of Mississippi Press. {{ISBN|0-87805-833-8}}.
* Rollyson, Carl and Lisa Paddock (2000). ''Susan Sontag: The Making of an Icon''. W. W. Norton.
* [[Ekaterina Vasileva (art historian)|Vasilieva, E. V]] (2014). [https://www.researchgate.net/publication/367635642_Vasilieva_E_V_2014_Susan_Sontag_on_photography_the_idea_of_beauty_and_the_problem_of_norm_Vestnik_of_Saint_Petersburg_University_Arts_43_64-80 "Susan Sontag on photography: the idea of beauty and the problem of norm"] {{In lang|ru}}. ''Vestnik of Saint Petersburg University''. Arts, 4(3), 64–80.
* Weingrad, Michael (November 12, 2019). [https://mosaicmagazine.com/observation/history-ideas/2019/11/the-sorry-significance-of-susan-sontag/ "The Sorry Significance of Susan Sontag"]. Observations. ''Mosaic''. A review of B. Moser's book ''Sontag''.

==Further reading==
* ''Susan Sontag: The Elegiac Modernist'' by Sohnya Sayres, {{ISBN|9780415900317}} (1990)
* ''Susan Sontag: The Making of an Icon'' by Carl Rollyson and Lisa Paddock, {{ISBN|9781628462371}} (2000)
* ''Sontag and Kael'' by Craig Seligman, {{ISBN|9781582433127}} (2004)
* ''The Din in the Head'' by [[Cynthia Ozick]], {{ISBN|9780618470501}} (2006; Sontag is discussed in the foreword, "On Discord and Desire")
* ''Swimming in a Sea of Death: A Son's Memoir'' by [[David Rieff]], {{ISBN|9780743299473}} (2008)
* ''Notes on Sontag'' by [[Phillip Lopate]], {{ISBN|9781400829873}} (2009)
* ''Susan Sontag: A Biography'' by Daniel Schreiber (trans. David Dollenmayer), Northwestern {{ISBN|9780810125834}} (2014)
* ''Sempre Susan: A Memoir of Susan Sontag'' by [[Sigrid Nunez]], {{ISBN|9781594633348}} (2014)
* ''Tough Enough: Arbus, Arendt, Didion, McCarthy, Sontag, Weil'' by Deborah Nelson, {{ISBN|9780226457802}} (2017)
* ''Susan Sontag und Thomas Mann'' by Kai Sina, {{ISBN|9783835330214}} (2017)
* ''[[Sontag: Her Life and Work]]'' by [[Benjamin Moser]], HarperCollins, {{ISBN|9780062896414}} (2019)

==External links==
{{Wikiquote}}
{{Commons category}}
* {{Official website}}
* {{cite journal| url=http://www.theparisreview.org/interviews/1505/the-art-of-fiction-no-143-susan-sontag| title=Susan Sontag, The Art of Fiction No. 143| author=Edward Hirsch| journal=The Paris Review| date=Winter 1995 | volume=Winter 1995| issue=137}}
* [https://www.abc.net.au/radionational/programs/archived/booksandwriting/susan-sontag/3630106 "with Ramona Koval]", ''Books and Writing,'' [[ABC Radio National]], January 30, 2005
* [https://pen.org/thrown-voices-richard-howard-susan-sontag/ Susan Sontag and Richard Howard] from "The Writer, The Work", a series sponsored by PEN and curated by Susan Sontag
* [https://web.archive.org/web/20130108070952/http://www.pen.org/nonfiction-essay/american-language-and-culture Susan Sontag wrote an essay: ''On American Language and Culture''] from PEN American Center
* [https://pen.org/the-politics-of-translation-a-discussion/ The Politics of Translation: Discussion], with panel members Susan Sontag, [[Esther Allen]], Ammiel Alcalay, Michael Hofmann & Steve Wasserman, PEN American Center
* {{usurped|1=[https://web.archive.org/web/20070926234611/http://www.mathieu-bourgois.com/photos-auteur.asp?Clef=55 Susan Sontag]}} – Photos by Mathieu Bourgois.
* [https://tomdispatch.com/susan-sontag-on-the-great-atlantic-divide/ The ''Friedenspreis'' acceptance speech (2003-10-12)]
* [http://www.history.ucsb.edu/faculty/marcuse/classes/33d/33dTexts/SontagFascinFascism75.htm ''Fascinating Fascism''] illustrated text of Sontag's foundational 1974 article on Nazi filmmaker [[Leni Riefenstahl]]'s aesthetics, from ''[[Under the Sign of Saturn]]''
* [https://www.newyorker.com/archive/2001/09/24/010924ta_talk_wtc Sontag's comments in ''The New Yorker'', September 24, 2001] about the September 11 attack on the United States
* [http://www.lrb.co.uk/v27/n06/cast01_.html Terry Castle, ''Desperately Seeking Susan'', ''London Review of Books'', March 2005] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20090522142805/http://www.lrb.co.uk/v27/n06/cast01_.html |date=May 22, 2009}}
* [https://web.archive.org/web/20071109133720/http://www.observer.com/node/50298 Sheelah Kolhatkar, "Notes on camp Sontag"] ''New York Observer'', January 8, 2005
* {{IMDb name|814506|Susan Sontag}}
* [https://web.archive.org/web/20090411034134/http://www.tnr.com/booksarts/story.html?id=66c66cf7-996f-499d-ba65-67bcdea7b220 'Susan Sontag: The Collector],' by Daniel Mendelsohn, ''The New Republic''
* {{C-SPAN|45774}}
* [http://www.c-spanvideo.org/program/172991-1 ''In Depth'' interview with Sontag, March 2, 2003]
* {{Muckrack}}

{{Susan Sontag}}
{{NBA for Fiction 2000–2024}}
{{Prince of Asturias Award for Literature}}
{{Authority control}}

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