Stephen Marche (born 1976) is a Canadian novelist, essayist, and cultural commentator. He is an alumnus of the University of King's College and City College of New York (CUNY). In 2005, he received a doctorate in early modern English drama from the University of Toronto. He taught Renaissance drama at CUNY until 2007, when he resigned in order to write full-time.

Career as writer

Marche is a contributing editor at Esquire, for which he writes a monthly column entitled "A Thousand Words about Our Culture". In 2011, this column was a finalist for the American Society of Magazine Editors award for columns and commentary. Marche's articles also appear in The New York Times, The New Yorker, The Atlantic, The Walrus, The Guardian, and other publications. Marche is also a weekly contributor to CBC Radio. Marche's novel Raymond and Hannah was published in 2005. An anthology of short stories linked by a common plot element, Shining at the Bottom of the Sea, followed in 2007. How Shakespeare Changed Everything was published in 2011. Another novel, The Hunger Of The Wolf, was published in February 2015. Marche's take on the state of male–female relations in the 21st century, The Unmade Bed: The Messy Truth About Men and Women in the Twenty-First Century, was published in March 2017 with contributions from his wife. Marche wrote an opinion piece published by The New York Times on August 14, 2015, titled "The Closing of the Canadian Mind." In this article he was critical of Stephen Harper, the Prime Minister of Canada, linking him with Rob Ford, former Mayor of Toronto who was involved in a crack cocaine scandal. Marche also published an opinion piece in The New York Times on November 25, 2017, titled "The Unexamined Brutality of the Male Libido," about the challenges and necessity of male engagement with feminism. Marche wrote an essay published by The New York Times Book Review on February 26, 2023, titled "A Writer's Lament: The Better You Write, the More You Will Fail". The essay discussed writing and failure and noted that "failure" is normal for writers much of the time, and that near-obsessive persevering in the face of failure to be published is the mark of a true writer. In particular, he noted that a writer may have commercial success at times, but still, their best work may be the biggest failure (perhaps only recognized after a writer has died--using Melville's Billy Budd as an example). In the last paragraph of the essay, Marche wrote: "Good writers offer advice. Great writers offer condolences."

Personal life

Marche is married to Sarah Fulford, the former editor-in-chief of Toronto Life magazine. Fulford is a daughter of Canadian journalist Robert Fulford. Marche and Fulford have a son and daughter, and live in Toronto.

Novels

Short fiction

Non-fiction

Essays and reporting