Janet Frame summary

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Janet Frame, (born Aug. 28, 1924, Dunedin, N.Z.—died Jan. 29, 2004, Dunedin), New Zealand novelist, short-story writer, and poet. After an impoverished childhood, she trained as a teacher. Her first book was the story collection The Lagoon (1951). Several times committed to mental institutions, she narrowly escaped undergoing a frontal lobotomy. Her novel Owls Do Cry (1957) incorporated poetry and prose in its investigation of the border between sanity and madness. Her many other novels, several of which draw on Maori legends, include Scented Gardens for the Blind (1963) and The Carpathians (1988). One of her three volumes of memoirs, An Angel at My Table (1984), was filmed by Jane Campion.

autobiography Summary

Autobiography, the biography of oneself narrated by oneself. Autobiographical works can take many forms, from the intimate writings made during life that were not necessarily intended for publication (including letters, diaries, journals, memoirs, and reminiscences) to a formal book-length

poetry Summary

Poetry, literature that evokes a concentrated imaginative awareness of experience or a specific emotional response through language chosen and arranged for its meaning, sound, and rhythm. (Read Britannica’s biography of this author, Howard Nemerov.) Poetry is a vast subject, as old as history and

short story Summary

Short story, brief fictional prose narrative that is shorter than a novel and that usually deals with only a few characters. The short story is usually concerned with a single effect conveyed in only one or a few significant episodes or scenes. The form encourages economy of setting, concise

novel Summary

Novel, an invented prose narrative of considerable length and a certain complexity that deals imaginatively with human experience, usually through a connected sequence of events involving a group of persons in a specific setting. Within its broad framework, the genre of the novel has encompassed an