Watching author Sloane Crosley ’00 walk across the stage in Evans Hall, it was hard to believe that someone that put together had been a Conn student so recently. She was one of us, but the successful, naturally charming and witty version of us that we all want to be at some point after graduation. Crosley was the keynote speaker during Parents’ Weekend, and Evans Hall was completely full. Parents crossed and uncrossed their legs, checking their schedules while their respective Conn-student-children checked their phones, waiting for the event to really start.
President Bergeron introduced Sloane Crosley by running through a very long list of Crosley’s accomplishments, including a place on The New York Times bestseller list and a feature on NPR. She also recently launched a website called Sad Stuff on the Street and encouraged submissions, which must be “ironic sad.”
It must have been strange to come back, looking out over a room that, according to her, seemed so much larger now that she wasn’t a part of the audience. “They say that when you go back someplace it looks a lot smaller. That’s not happening here,” she said.
Connecticut College was “wonderfully different” from her world at home, where most of the reading materials were old issues of National Geographic. Also appealing, Connecticut wasn’t a part of New England, but an extension of Westchester County. She said Conn was a “vision of New England,” and she wasn’t wrong. She fell in love with Tempel Green and was baffled by the architecture of Shain. “That one doesn’t look like the others.” Despite its status as an outcast compared to the other buildings, Shain became the place where Crosley would spend most of her time at Conn, accompanied, of course, by late-night Taco Bell snacks and the occasional case of the giggles on the third floor – which she referred to as “the nunnery.”
Crosley’s Conn experience was completely changed with the guidance of Professor Blanche Boyd of the English department, who convinced her that anthropology was not the major for her, and told her in her famously soft voice, “Somebody up there gave you something wonderful and you have no idea what to do with it.” Her English major sent her into the world of publishing, where she worked as a publicist. This, she said, became a very hard job once her own books were published and she had to choose between promoting the books of others and promoting her own
Crosley spent a good half hour answering the questions of parents who had no further interest in her than her career advice. Crosley quit her day job as a publicist to write, spending time in France to get to know the French countryside house featured in her novel. She established a new career as a published author.
Her first two books are compilations of essays she wrote, many of which were published in various New York newspapers. The Clasp, her most recent book, is her first novel. She finished her speech with an excerpt from the book, narrated by one of three main characters, the misunderstood Victor. The passage was as funny as anyone could have hoped and more relatable than people would want to admit.
Crosley switched from nonfiction to fiction because she was sick of “hitting walls.” She said that in nonfiction you have an obligation to tell the truth but to maintain the privacy of those you write about; they aren’t fictional characters. Fiction gave her the power to make up her own world and do what she willed with it, but she also made sure to mention the responsibility she had to her new, fictional characters. Everything that happened to them was her fault. Their entire world was of her making. “You can’t hide behind it.” That resulting pressure rivals the pressure she feels to tell the truth. The Clasp was an attempt to avoid her usual repertoire of short, witty narratives.
Sloane Crosley is every English major’s dream: published, awarded, featured on NPR and somehow still cool. Her jokes were funny, sometimes unplanned and convinced everyone there that they wanted to be her when they grew up.•
