Katherine Anne Porter (1890 – 1980), the American author and journalist, made a name for herself with her short stories and her magnum opus novel Ship of Fools (1962). Following is a forthright selection of quotes by Katherine Anne Porter, who never shied away from speaking her truth.
“My life has been incredible, I don’t believe a word of it.” That’s a famous quote that reflects a penchant for self-invention. She was considered somewhat flamboyant by some; unknowable by others.
Porter often took many years to accomplish her literary goals; writing was a way to face questions encountered in her own life. Her writing voice was rooted in realism and a sense of passion. Read More→
Baroness Orczy (September 23, 1865 – November 12, 1947) was born Emma (or “Emmuska”) Magdolna Rozália Mária Jozefa Borbála Orczy de Orci in Tarnaörs, Heves County, Hungary. She’s best known for The Scarlet Pimpernel and its numerous sequels, some of which were adapted to stage and film.
Both of her parents were of aristocratic ancestry. Her father Felix was a Baron and a composer and her mother, also named Emma, was a Countess and daughter of a member of the Hungarian parliament.
When revolution threatened Hungary in 1868, her parents were forced to flee their homeland and lived at various times in Budapest, Paris, and Brussels until 1880 when the family settled in London. There, Emma studied both art and music. Some of her art works were exhibited at the Royal Academy. Read More→
The 1979 movie My Brilliant Career was largely true to the novel of the same name by Australian author Miles Franklin (1897 – 1954) Her first book, it was published in 1901, when she was in her early twenties, though it was written while she was still in her teens.
The novel’s protagonist, Sybilla Melvyn, is a headstrong, creative young woman who fights convention, wishing to assert her independence and become a writer.
Starring Judy Davis and Sam Neill, and directed by Gillian Armstrong, the film enjoyed positive reviews and won a number of awards. Here is one such review that appeared after its American release. Read More→
From the 1957 E.P. Dutton Edition of Those Without Shadows by Françoise Sagan: Bonjour Tristesse and A Certain Smile, Françoise Sagan’s first two novels, made literary history because of the youth and amorality of their heroines and the elegant excellence of the writing.
Now in this brilliant third novel (originally published in French as Dans un Mois, Dans un An), the exciting young author explores with the same precision but with added warmth and authority the wayward hearts of a circle of sophisticated Parisians. Read More→
Jo March, the standout sister among the quartet in Little Women, is one of the most iconic and influential female characters in literature. Here we’ll take a look at ten women writers who were inspired by Jo March. Certainly, there are countless others — maybe even you!
What’s unique and wondrous is that the fictional character of Jo March influenced generations of women writers, more so even than the real-life author who wrote her into existence.
Tomboyish and ambitious, with a bit of a temper, Jo was an idealized alter ego of her creator, Louisa May Alcott. Read More→
Miles Franklin (1879 – 1954) was an Australian writer best known for her 1901 novel, My Brilliant Career. Following is a selection of quotes by Miles Franklin that will help us get to know this under-appreciated author a bit better.
Franklin is also an unsung early feminist. She traveled to the United States when she became a participant of the women’s movement and joined the National Women’s Trade Union League of America.
When she began her writing career in earnest, she, like George Eliot and other female authors, she dropped her first names (Stella Maria Sarah) and retained the last part of it — Miles Franklin — thinking it would help achieve a more serious literary reputation. She employed a number of other noms de plume throughout her writing career, because, ruth be told, it was a way to ease the sting of critical reviews. Read More→
We Have Always Lived in the Castle (1962) was the last published work by Shirley Jackson during her lifetime. The narrator, Mary Katherine “Merricat” Blackwood, lives with her sister and uncle on an isolated estate in rural Vermont.
The Blackwoods have been shunned by the neighbors in the nearby village due to a tragedy — murder by poisoning — that occurred some years earlier.
This critically acclaimed novel is considered one of Jackson’s masterpieces; and it has been an inspiration to authors that came after who write in the thriller and mystery genres. Read More→
Raising Demons by Shirley Jackson is a 1957 memoir of motherhood and domestic tribulations. Wry and humorous, it serves up an idealized version of this author’s family’s life in North Bennington, Vermont, and is a departure from her fictional tales of psychological terror — notably, The Lottery (1949).
How much of the depiction of this family’s life reflects reality is an open question. Jackson’s husband, Stanley Edgar Hyman, a literary critic and professor, was chronically unfaithful, controlling, and belittling.
Jackson herself was a heavy smoker, overweight, and may have been addicted to prescription barbiturates due to anxiety. She was only 48 when she died of heart failure in her sleep in 1965. Read More→
