Hamilton Gazetteer / Entities / Roz Chast

The content of this site was generated automatically using Claude Code and Mnemotron-R, based on OCR data from Spectator (1947–2025) and other college archival materials hosted at the Internet Archive. It it intended as a proof of concept for the Mnemotron-R project, and has not been reviewed for completeness or accuracy by a human reviewer.

Contact Hamilton College Archives for authoratiative access to College history.

person

Roz Chast

Overview

Roz Chast (born 1954) is an American cartoonist and the long-time staff cartoonist for The New Yorker, where she has published work since 1978 and where she has become one of the magazine’s most beloved contributors. Her graphic memoir Can’t We Talk About Something More Pleasant? (2014) — an account of caring for her aging parents — won the National Book Award for Nonfiction, a Kirkus Prize, and a Will Eisner Comic Industry Award. Chast attended Kirkland College (Hamilton’s coordinate women’s college) and graduated with the Class of 1975.

Relevance to Research

Chast’s Kirkland years (1971–1975) place her at the coordinate college during the founding era of that institution, before the 1978 merger with Hamilton. She was among the first generation of Kirkland women to build a nationally significant career in the arts. Her trajectory — from Kirkland to the Rhode Island School of Design and then to The New Yorker — illustrates Kirkland’s emphasis on arts and the creative life. She is among the most prominent alumni of the Kirkland College era.

Notes

Role: Kirkland College alumna, Class of 1975 (now Hamilton College) Key events: - Born 26 November 1954 in Brooklyn, New York - Attended Kirkland College (Hamilton’s coordinate women’s college), graduating 1975 - Received B.F.A. from Rhode Island School of Design (1977) - First cartoon published in The New Yorker (1978); became a staff cartoonist - Has published more than 1,000 cartoons in The New Yorker - Author and illustrator of numerous cartoon collections including Parallel Universes (1984), Mondo Boxo (2007), and Going into Town: A Love Letter to New York (2017) - Can’t We Talk About Something More Pleasant? (2014): graphic memoir about her parents’ aging; won National Book Award for Nonfiction, Kirkus Prize, Eisner Award - Listed by Comics Alliance as one of twelve women cartoonists deserving of lifetime achievement recognition - Recipient of a Guggenheim Fellowship (2018)