Franzen, Jonathan

American writer and essayist Jonathan Franzen was born in Western Springs, Illinois, and grew up in Webster Groves, a suburb of St. Louis, Missouri. His paternal grandfather immigrated from Sweden some time around the year 1900. This man married a Swedish woman of Norwegian lineage, according to family lore. Franzen’s father was born in the USA, while his mother had a mixed Eastern European ancestry. Nuances of both his mother and his grandfather are present in Franzen’s novels.