New Yorker names fiction editor

A little-known 32-year-old UC Berkeley graduate has been named fiction editor of the New Yorker, succeeding Bill Buford, a familiar presence on the literary scene. David Remnick, the magazine’s editor, has announced that deputy fiction editor Deborah Treisman will begin her new post in January.

“I think that Bill and I and the other members of the fiction department -- particularly Cressiday Leyshon, who’ll be the new deputy fiction editor -- have had a fantastic run together, working to find the best fiction out there, and I can only hope to build on what’s already been done,” Treisman said in an e-mail Monday.

“Bill set the bar very high, and I hope to continue to champion the writers he brought in, and to continue to discover new ones, locally, nationally and internationally.”

Buford, 48, will become a European correspondent and write nonfiction books. Remnick has called Buford “one of the great fiction editors that the New Yorker has ever had.” Traditionally, the position has been one of the most influential in the literary world. Under Buford’s watch, up-and-comers such as Dave Eggers and Zadie Smith were published along with such veterans as Stephen King and Alice Munro.

Treisman, a native of England, is a former managing editor of the literary journal Grand Street. During her tenure there, the journal published works by younger, edgy writers such as David Foster Wallace and William T. Vollmann.