Margaret Atwood
| Margaret Atwood | |
|---|---|
| 220px Margaret Atwood at a demonstration in 1988 | |
| Born | November 18 1939 (age 84) Ottawa, Ontario, Canada |
| Occupation | Novelist, Poet |
| Nationality | Canadian |
| Writing period | 1960s to present |
| Genres | Romance, Historical fiction, Speculative fiction, Dystopian fiction |
| Notable work(s) | The Handmaid's Tale, Cat's Eye, Alias Grace, The Blind Assassin, Oryx and Crake, Surfacing |
| Official website | |
Medieval literature Margaret Eleanor Atwood, CC (born November 18, 1939) is a Canadian writer, a prolific poet, novelist, literary critic, feminist and activist. Many of her poems have been inspired by myths, and fairy tales, which were an interest of hers from an early age. Atwood has also published short stories in Tamarack Review, Alphabet, Harper's, CBC Anthology, Ms., Saturday Night, Playboy, and many other magazines.
Biography
Born in Ottawa, Ontario, Atwood is the second of three children of Carl Edmund Atwood, an entomologist, and Margaret Dorothy Killiam, a former dietitian and nutritionist.[1] Due to her father’s ongoing research in forest entomology, Atwood spent much of her childhood in the backwoods of Northern Quebec and back and forth between Ottawa, Sault Ste. Marie and Toronto. She did not attend school full-time until she was 11 years old. She became a voracious reader of literature, Dell pocketbook mysteries, Grimm's Fairy Tales, Canadian animal stories, and comic books. She attended Leaside High School in Leaside, Toronto and graduated in 1957.[1]
Atwood began writing at age six and realized she wanted to write professionally when she was 16. In 1957, she began studying at Victoria University in the University of Toronto. Her professors included Jay Macpherson and Northrop Frye. She graduated in 1961 with a Bachelor of Arts in English (honors) and minors in philosophy and French.[1]
In late 1961, after winning the E.J. Pratt Medal for her privately printed book of poems, Double Persephone, she began graduate studies at Harvard's Radcliffe College with a Woodrow Wilson fellowship. She obtained a master's degree (MA) from Radcliffe in 1962 and pursued further graduate studies at Harvard University for 2 years, but never finished because she never completed a dissertation on “The English Metaphysical Romance” in 1967. She has taught at the University of British Columbia (1965), Sir George Williams University in Montreal (1967-68), the University of Alberta (1969-79), York University in Toronto (1971-72), and New York University, where she was Berg Professor of English.
In 1968, Atwood married Jim Polk, whom she divorced in 1973. She formed a relationship with fellow novelist Graeme Gibson soon after and moved to Alliston, Ontario, north of Toronto. In 1976 their daughter, Eleanor Jess Atwood Gibson, was born. Atwood returned to Toronto in 1980, dividing her time between Toronto and Pelee Island, Ontario.
In March 2008 it was announced by Atwood, via television hookup between Toronto and Vancouver, that she had accepted her first chamber opera commission. 'Pauline' will be on the subject of Pauline Johnson, a writer and Canadian artist long a subject of fascination to Atwood. It will star Judith Forst, with music by Christos Hatzis, and be produced by City Opera of Vancouver. 'Pauline' will be set at Vancouver, British Columbia, in March 1913, in the last week in the life of Johnson.
Work
Atwood has written thematically diverse novels from a number of genres and traditions, including science fiction/speculative fiction,[2] space opera and Southern Ontario Gothic. She is often described as a feminist writer, as issues of gender often (but not always) appear prominently in her work. Her work has focused on Canadian national identity, Canada’s relations with the United States and Europe, human rights issues, environmental issues, the Canadian wilderness, the social myths of femininity, representations of women’s bodies in art, women’s social and economic exploitation, as well as women’s relations with each other and with men (Howells 163). In her novel Oryx and Crake and in recent essays, she has demonstrated great interest in (and wariness of) unchecked biotechnology.
Her first collection of poetry was Double Persephone (1961). The Circle Game (1964), her second, won the Governor General's award for poetry. Of Atwood's poetry collections, the most well-known is perhaps The Journals of Susanna Moodie (1970), in which Atwood writes poems from the viewpoint of Susanna Moodie, a historical nineteenth-century Canadian pioneer on the frontier.
As a literary critic, she is best known as author of the seminal Survival: A Thematic Guide to Canadian Literature (1972), which is credited with sparking renewed interest in Canadian literature in the 1970s. She also wrote several television scripts, The Servant Girl (1974) and Days of the Rebels: 1815-1840 (1977).
Atwood has been vice-chairman of the Writers' Union of Canada and president of International PEN (1984-1986), an international group committed to promoting freedom of expression and freeing writers who are political prisoners. Elected a Senior Fellow of Massey College at the University of Toronto, she has sixteen honorary degrees, including a doctorate from Victoria College (1987), and was inducted into Canada's Walk of Fame in 2001. Her literary papers are housed at the University of Toronto's Thomas Fisher Rare Book Library.
Critical reception
The Economist called her a 'scintillating wordsmith' and an 'expert literary critic', but commented that her logic doesn't match her prose in Payback: Debt and the Shadow Side of Wealth.[3]
Political involvement
Although Atwood's politics are commonly described as being left wing, she has indicated in interviews that she considers herself a Red Tory.[4] Atwood and her partner Graeme Gibson are currently members of the Green Party of Canada and strong supporters of GPC leader Elizabeth May, whom Atwood has referred to as fearless, honest, reliable and knowledgeable. In the 2008 federal election she attended a rally for the Bloc Québécois, a Quebec separatist party, because of her support for their position on the arts, and stated that she would vote for the party if she lived in Quebec.[5] In a Globe and Mail editorial, she urged Canadians to vote for any other party to stop a Conservative majority.[6]
Atwood has strong views on environmental issues,[7] such as suggesting that gas-powered leaf blowers and lawn mowers be banned, and has made her own home more energy efficient – including not having air-conditioning - by installing awnings and skylights that open. She and her partner also use a hybrid car when they are in the city.
During the debate in 1987 over a free trade agreement between Canada and the United States, Atwood came out against the deal. Her opposition included an essay she wrote opposing the agreement.[8]
Legacy
Atwood is a winner of the Arthur C. Clarke Award and Prince of Asturias award for Literature, has been shortlisted for the Booker Prize five times, winning once, and has been a finalist for the Governor General's Award seven times, winning twice. Atwood is among the most-honored authors of fiction in recent history.[9] While she is best known for her work as a novelist, her poetry is noteworthy.[10]
Works
Novels
Atwood is scheduled to publish a new novel in 2009. The book's title was initially reported in some media as God's Gardeners, although Atwood later confirmed that this was not the intended title. Poetry collections
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Short fiction collections
Anthologies edited
Children's books
Non-fiction
Drawings
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Wheel-show (1978-1981) for Times Magazine
Notes
- ↑ 1.0 1.1 1.2 http://www.luminarium.org/contemporary/atwood/atwood.htm
- ↑ London, 17 June 2005, The Guardian: "Aliens have taken the place of angels (Margaret Atwood on why we need science fiction," includes the line "I have written two works of science fiction or, if you prefer, speculative fiction."
- ↑ http://www.economist.com/books/displaystory.cfm?story_id=12414948
- ↑ "Margaret Atwood: The activist author of Alias Grace and The Handmaid's Tale discusses the politics of art and the art of the con", Mother Jones, July/August 1997.
- ↑ [1]
- ↑ Margaret, Atwood. Anything but a Harper majority. Globe and Mail. October. 6, 2008.
- ↑ Interview with author Margaret Atwood
- ↑ [2]
- ↑ Honor roll:Fiction authors. Award Annals (2007-11-17).
- ↑ Holcombe, Garan. (2005). "Margaret Atwood". Contemporary Writers. London: British Arts Council. Retrieved on 2008-10-22.
ReferencesISBN links support NWE through referral fees
- Carrington de Papp, I. Margaret Atwood and Her Works. Toronto: EWC, 1985.
- Cooke, N. Margaret Atwood: A Biography. Toronto: ECW, 1998.
- Hengen, Shannon and Ashley Thomson. Margaret Atwood: A Reference Guide, 1988-2005. Lanham, MD: Scarecrow Press, 2007.
- Howells, Coral Ann. Margaret Atwood. New York: St. Martin’s, 1996.
- Howells, Coral Ann. The Cambridge Companion to Margaret Atwood. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2006. ISBN 0-521-54851-9
- Rigney, B. Margaret Atwood. Totowa, NJ: Barnes & Noble, 1987.
- Rosenburg H. J. Margaret Atwood. Boston: Twayne, 1984.
- Sullivan, Rosemary. The Red Shoes: Margaret Atwood Starting Out. Toronto: HarperFlamingoCanada, 1998. ISBN 0-00-255423-2
Awards
External links
- Margaret Atwood's home page
- Margaret Atwood's entry in The Canadian Encyclopedia
- Margaret Atwood at the Internet Speculative Fiction Database
- Margaret Atwood at www.contemporarywriters.com
- The Margaret Atwood Society home page
- Luminarium Margaret Atwood Research guides to novels and short stories
- Profile from The Guardian
- Poems by Margaret Atwood at PoetryFoundation.org
- CBC Digital Archives - Margaret Atwood: Queen of CanLit
Interviews
- Margaret Atwood with Bill Moyers on Faith and Reason, PBS
- Audio Interview from BBC4
- Thomas Cahill in conversation with Margaret Atwood at LIVE from the New York Public Library, December 1, 2006.
- January 1997 Interview with Salon.com
- June 2006 Interview with CanadianLiving.com
- 1986 interview with Margaret Atwood by Don Swaim at Wired for Books
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| Persondata | |
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| NAME | Atwood, Margaret Eleanor |
| ALTERNATIVE NAMES | |
| SHORT DESCRIPTION | Canadian |
| DATE OF BIRTH | |
| PLACE OF BIRTH | Ottawa, Ontario, Canada |
| DATE OF DEATH | |
| PLACE OF DEATH | |
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