Lerner was born and raised in Topeka, Kansas, which figures in each of his books of poetry. His mother is the clinical psychologist Harriet Lerner.^[5] He is a 1997 graduate of Topeka High School, where he participated in debate and forensics, winning the 1997 National Forensic League National Tournament in International Extemporaneous Speaking.^[6] At Brown University he studied with poet C. D. Wright and earned a B.A. in political theory and an MFA in poetry.^[7]

Lerner was awarded the Hayden Carruth prize for his cycle of 52 sonnets, The Lichtenberg Figures.^[8] In 2004 Library Journal named it one of the year's 12 best books of poetry.

In 2003 Lerner traveled on a Fulbright Scholarship to Madrid, Spain, where he wrote his second book of poetry, Angle of Yaw, which was published in 2006. It was named a finalist for the National Book Award. His third poetry collection, Mean Free Path, was published in 2010.

Lerner's first novel, Leaving the Atocha Station, published in 2011,^[9] won the Believer Book Award^[10] and was a finalist for the Los Angeles Times Book Prize for first fiction (The Art Seidenbaum Award for First Fiction) and the New York Public Library's Young Lions Fiction Award. Writing in The Guardian, Geoff Dyer called it "a work so luminously original in style and form as to seem like a premonition, a comet from the future."^[11]

Excerpts of Lerner's second novel, 10:04, won the Terry Southern Prize from The Paris Review.^[12] Writing in the Los Angeles Review of Books, Maggie Nelson called 10:04 a "near perfect piece of literature."^[13]

The New York Times Book Review called Lerner's 2019 novel The Topeka School "a high-water mark in recent American fiction."^[14] Giles Harvey, in The New York Times Magazine, called it "the best book yet by the most talented writer of his generation." Lerner's essays, art criticism, and literary criticism have appeared in Harper's Magazine, the London Review of Books, The New York Review of Books, and The New Yorker, among other publications.^[15] The Topeka School, which won the Los Angeles Times Book Prize, was a finalist for the 2020 Pulitzer Prize for Fiction.^[16]

In 2023, Lerner published his fourth full-length book of poetry, both verse and prose poems, The Lights. In The New York Times, Srikanth Reddy wrote: "It takes a poet to invent characters who argue that 'the voice must be sung into existence.' It takes a novelist to honor so many perspectives, histories and intimacies in one book..The poet/novelist of The Lights enlarges Baudelaire’s experiments in prose poetry into a multistory dream house for contemporary American readers." In The New Yorker, Kamran Javadizadeh called The Lights "world-bridging poetry", "uncannily beautiful", and "exceedingly lovely".

In 2008 Lerner began editing poetry for Critical Quarterly, a British scholarly publication.^[17] In 2016 he became the first poetry editor at Harper's.^[18] He has taught at California College of the Arts and the University of Pittsburgh, and in 2010 joined the faculty of the MFA program at Brooklyn College.^[19]

In 2016 Lerner became a Fellow of the New York Institute for the Humanities.^[20] He received a 2015 MacArthur Fellowship.^[21]

In the December 2023 issue of Harper's Magazine, Lerner published a fictional story titled "The Hofmann Wobble: Wikipedia and the Problem of Historical Memory."^[22] In the story, Lerner demonstrates a familiarity with Wikipedian editing and administrative processes, as well as problematic issues such as circular reporting, sockfarm creation, and sponsored content on Wikipedia. He explained: "I've written a short story—or a kind of fictional essay (it's based on a real project of mine but all the facts have been altered)—about a young man's efforts to manipulate Wikipedia for the good (so he thinks) through the construction of multiple online identities."

Reflections about Lerner's piece prompted a "Disinformation Report" reflection in the December 4, 2023, issue of The Signpost.^[23]

Poetry edit

• The Lichtenberg figures. Port Townsend: Copper Canyon Press. 2004.
• Angle of Yaw. Port Townsend: Copper Canyon Press. 2006. ISBN 9781556592461.
• Mean Free Path. Port Townsend: Copper Canyon Press. 2010. ISBN 9781619320741.
• No Art. 2016. Collection of previous three volumes.
• The Lights. New York: Farrar, Straus, and Giroux 2023.

Novels edit

• Leaving the Atocha Station, Coffee House Press, 2011. ISBN 9781566892926
• 10:04, Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2014. ISBN 978-0865478107^[24]
• The Topeka School, Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2019.

Non-fiction edit

• The Hatred of Poetry. FSG Originals, 2016.

Edited volumes edit

• Keeping / the window open: Interviews, Statements, Alarms, Excursions. On Keith and Rosmarie Waldrop. Wave Books, 2019.

Collaborations with artists edit

• Blossom. Mack Books, 2015. With Thomas Demand.
• The Polish Rider. Mack Books, 2018. With Anna Ostoya.
• The Snows of Venice. Spector Books, 2018. With Alexander Kluge
• Gold Custody. Mack Books, 2021. With Barbara Bloom
• The Clichés. Song Cave Editions, 2022. With R. H. Quaytman

• 2003 – Hayden Carruth Award^[25]
• 2003–2004 – Fulbright Fellowship^[26]
• 2006 – Finalist, National Book Award^[27] for Angle of Yaw.
• 2006 – Finalist, Northern California Book Awards for Angle of Yaw^[28]
• 2007 – Kansas Notable Book Award for Angle of Yaw
• 2010–2011 – Howard Foundation Fellowship^[29]
• 2011 – Preis der Stadt Münster für internationale Poesie^[30]
• 2011 – Finalist, Los Angeles Times Book Prize for first fiction^[31]
• 2012 – Finalist, Young Lions Fiction Award of the New York Public Library^[32]
• 2012 – Believer Book Award^[10]
• 2012 – Finalist, William Saroyan International Prize for Writing^[33]
• 2012 – Finalist, PEN/Bingham Award^[34]
• 2013 – Finalist, James Tait Black Memorial Prize^[35]
• 2013 – Guggenheim Fellowship^[15]
• 2014 – Terry Southern Fiction Prize from The Paris Review^[12]
• 2014 – Finalist, Folio Prize^[36]
• 2017 – named one of Granta's best young American novelists
• 2015–2020 Winner, MacArthur Foundation Fellowship
• 2019 – Finalist, Folio Prize
• 2019 – Finalist, National Book Critics Circle Award
• 2019 Winner, Kansas Notable Book Award
• 2019 – Winner, Los Angeles Times Book Prize for Fiction
• 2020 – Finalist, Pulitzer Prize for Fiction^[3]
• 2024 -- Long listed for The Griffin Prize for poetry

• An essay about The Topeka School and Lerner's other novels at Harper's
• An excerpt from The Topeka School at The New Yorker
• Lerner's page and the MacArthur Foundation
• Lerner's page for the Griffin Poetry Prize
• An editorial by Lerner against funding cuts in higher education
• Interview with Ariana Reines in Bomb Magazine
• Lerner's page at the Guggenheim Foundation
• Lerner's National Book Award page Archived 2011-07-16 at the Wayback Machine
• Lerner's page at Narrative magazine
• Interview with Lerner in The New Yorker
• Interview with Lerner in The Believer
• Interview with Lerner in Bookforum
• Interview with Lerner in The Huffington Post
• Audio of Lerner poetry reading
• "My First Time" interview with Lerner by The Paris Review