STELLA KUPFERBERG MEMORIAL SHORT STORY PRIZE

The Stella Kupferberg Memorial Short Story Prize is awarded annually by Selected Shorts and a guest author judge. This year, Anthony Doerr selected Matthew Ryan Frankel’s “Carapace” as the 2023 winner. Please enjoy Philip Estrera's performance of this story.

The story is also available to read on Electric Literature:

Matthew Ryan Frankel lives in Baltimore, Maryland. He would like to acknowledge his friends, his former teachers, and the staff of Enoch Pratt Central Library for their support, as well as the writers whose influence shaped the story printed here: Jean Genet, Yasunari Kawabata, and Kenzaburo Oë. His current projects include several short stories, a novel, and a philosophical work on radical freedom. “Carapace” is dedicated to his grandfather, Khye Weng Ng.

Philip Estrera is a NYC-based actor whose theater credits include Discus with Hunger & Thirst Theatre, Orphan of Zhao at La Jolla Playhouse, and Lysley Tenorio’s Monstress at the American Conservatory Theater. He appeared in the Sesame Street Thanksgiving special as Anton the bus driver, which introduced the first Asian American puppet to the series. He can be seen in episodes of Blue Bloods and New Amsterdam. He recently appeared in and helped develop the original new musical Monstress by Emily Kitchens, which featured all original bluegrass music and showcased him acting and fiddling. Estrera is a graduate of the American Conservatory Theater’s MFA program.

Anthony Doerr is the author of Cloud Cuckoo Land, which was a finalist for the National Book Award, and All the Light We Cannot See, winner of the Pulitzer Prize, the Carnegie Medal, the Alex Award, and a #1 New York Times bestseller. He is also the author of the story collections Memory Wall and The Shell Collector, the novel About Grace, and the memoir Four Seasons in Rome. He has won five O. Henry Prizes, the Rome Prize, the New York Public Library’s Young Lions Award, the National Magazine Award for fiction, a Guggenheim Fellowship, and the Story Prize. Born and raised in Cleveland, Ohio, Doerr lives in Boise, Idaho, with his wife and two sons.