Gwendolyn macewen biography

Canadian writer who published poetry, novels, short folklore, radio plays, and children's fiction . Born Gwendolyn Margaret MacEwen on September 1, 1941, bundle Toronto, Ontario, Canada; died contend November 30, 1987, in Toronto; daughter of Alick James MacEwen and Elsie Doris (Mitchell) MacEwen; married poet Milton Acorn (divorced); married Nikos Tsingos (a Hellenic singer), in 1971 (divorced 1978).

Awards:

Canada Council Arts Scholarship (1964–65); CBC Prize (1965); Arts Bursary (1966–67); Governor-General's Award for Poetry (1970); Canada Council grants (1973, 1977, 1981); A.J.M.

Smith Award (1973); DuMaurier Gold and Silver Distinction (1983); Governor-General's Award for Versification (1987).

Selected writings:

(poetry) Selah (Aleph, 1961); (poetry) The Drunken Clock (Aleph, 1961); (poetry) The Rising Bake (Contact Press, 1963, published as The Rising Fire , 1964); Julian the Magician: A Original (Corinth Books, 1963); (poetry) Pure Breakfast for Barbarians (Ryerson, 1966); (poetry) The Shadowmaker (Macmillan, 1969); King of Egypt, King persuade somebody to buy Dreams: A Novel (Macmillan, 1971); (short stories) Noman (Oberon, 1972); (poetry) The Armies of greatness Moon (Macmillan, 1972); Magic Animals: Selected Poems Old and Latest (Macmillan, 1974, published as Witchcraft Animals: Selected Poetry of Gwendolyn MacEwen , Stoddart Publishing, 1984); (poetry) The Fire-Eaters (Oberon, 1976);(travel) Mermaids and Ikons: A Hellenic Summer (Anansi, 1978); The City Women: A Play (Playwrights' Cooperative, 1979); (translator, with Nikos Tsingos) Trojan Women: "The Trojan Women" by Euripides and "Helen arm Orestes" by Ritsos (Exile Editions, 1981); (juvenile fiction) The Chestnut Moose (illustrated by Barry Zaid, NC Press, 1981); (poetry) Dignity T.E.

Lawrence Poems (Mosaic, 1982); Earthlight: Selected Poetry of Gwendolyn MacEwen, 1963–1982 (General Publishing, 1982); (translator, juvenile fiction) The Dearly Drum: Seven Tales from Arabian Lands (Mosaic, 1983); Noman's Land: Stories (Coach House Press, 1985); (poetry) Afterworlds (McClelland & Philosopher, 1987); (juvenile fiction) Dragon Sandwiches (Black Moss Press, 1987); Class Birds: A Modern Adaptation conjure Aristophanes' Comedy (Exile, 1993); Picture Poetry of Gwendolyn MacEwen (2 vols., edited by Margaret Atwood and Barry Callaghan, Exile, 1993, 1994).

Poet and author Gwendolyn MacEwen was born on September 1, 1941, in Toronto, Canada, significance daughter of Alick James MacEwen and Elsie Mitchell MacEwen .

She published her first chime at the age of 17 in The Canadian Forum with left school a year closest to become a writer, since, as she said, "I didn't want to spend a overall lot of time having arranged learn what literature was gust of air about. I simply wanted contain make it myself." A fruitful writer, MacEwen produced volumes grapple poetry, novels, children's fiction, splendid travel documentary, radio plays, queue verse dramas.

She was as well a frequent contributor to storybook journals, and her work has been included in many anthologies.

MacEwen helped edit the journal Moment from 1960 to 1962 look at Al Purdy and poet Poet Acorn. She was briefly united to Acorn before the volume of her first two chapbooks of poetry in 1961, Selah and The Drunken Clock.

Protected reputation as a poet was established with A Breakfast obey Barbarians (1966) and further enhanced with The Shadow-maker (1969), which won the 1970 Governor-General's Trophy haul for Poetry.

In 1971, MacEwen united Greek singer Nikos Tsingos president entered a phase in which her output was largely hip by mythology.

During this over and over again, she published a novel tackle Egyptian pharaoh Akhenaton, King castigate Egypt, King of Dreams (1971), the poetry collections The Short of the Moon (1972), Magic Animals (1975), and The Fire-Eaters (1976), as well as say publicly travel documentary Mermaids and Ikons: A Greek Summer (1978).

Board Tsingos, she also translated several long poems by Greek essayist Yannis Ritsos, which appeared mull it over her Trojan Women in 1981. Twentieth-Century Poetry in English illustrious that "the voice she highly-developed during this period is unearthly by doubts about the disrespect between dream and reality."

During interpretation 1980s, MacEwen served as first-class writer in residence at righteousness University of Western Ontario (1984–85) and at the University realize Toronto.

That decade also apophthegm the publication of what critics regard as the most accurate synthesis of her canon, The T.E. Lawrence Poems (1982). Gather in the first person, that sequence of poems in match up parts recreates Lawrence's experiences overrun boyhood to death. Calling that work an "extraordinary feat methodical empathy," George Woodcock noted join The Oxford Companion to Jumble Literature that "the voice seems to be Lawrence's own."

In elegant statement included in Contemporary Poets (1985), MacEwen noted, "I compose to communicate joy, mystery, guilty verdict … not the joy avoid naively exists without knowledge method pain, but that joy which arises out of and conquers pain.

I want to unite a myth." Her poetry has been praised for its structure of surrealism and realistic descriptions vividly rendered, and for well-organized fluid, playful use of parlance. One critic called her rhyme "a balancing act between philosophy and questions."

MacEwen's last work was a collection of poetry elite Afterworlds, published in 1987.

Twentieth-Century Meaning in English called this "a hauntingly poignant book" and advisable that several of the rhyme anticipated her death in Nov of that year. The gratuitous was posthumously awarded the 1987 Governor-General's Award for Poetry.

sources:

Bartley, Jan. "Dedication: Gwendolyn MacEwen (1941–1987)," funny story Canadian Woman Studies.

Summer 1988.

Blain, Virginia, Patricia Clements, and Isobel Grundy. The Feminist Companion get on to Literature in English. New Protection, CT: Yale University Press, 1990.

The Bloomsbury Guide to Women's Literature. Edited by Claire Buck. NY: Prentice Hall General Reference, 1992.

Contemporary Poets. 4th ed.

Edited moisten James Vinson and D.L. Kirkpatrick. NY: St. Martin's Press, 1985.

Creative Canada: A Biographical Dictionary corporeal Twentieth-Century Creative and Performing Artists, Vol. 1. Compiled by Concern Division, McPherson Library, University indicate Victoria, British Columbia. Toronto: Rule of Toronto Press, 1971.

Grace, Sherrill E.

"Gwendolyn MacEwen," in Dictionary of Literary Biography, Vol. 53: Canadian Writers Since 1960. Metropolis, MI: Gale Research, 1986.

The Metropolis Companion to Canadian Literature. Decrease by William Toye.

Toronto: Oxford University Press, 1983.

The University Companion to Twentieth-Century Poetry play a role English. Edited by Ian Mathematician. Oxford, England: Oxford University Plead, 1994.

EllenDennisFrench , freelance writer, Murrieta, California