Janette Turner Hospital

{{Short description|Australian-born novelist and short story writer}}

{{Infobox writer

| name = Janette Turner Hospital

| birth_name = Janette Turner

| birth_date = 1942

| birth_place = Melbourne, Victoria

| death_date =

| death_place =

| occupation = Novelist

| language = English

| nationality = Australian

| ethnicity =

| citizenship =

| education =

| alma_mater =

| notableworks = Due Preparations for the Plague

| awards = 2004 Davitt Award

| years_active = 1976-

}}

Janette Turner Hospital (née Turner) (born 1942) is an Australian-born novelist and short story writer who has lived most of her adult life in Canada or the United States, principally Boston (Massachusetts), Kingston (Ontario) and Columbia (South Carolina).Selina Samuels. "Janette Turner Hospital".Dictionary of Literary Biography: Australian Writers 1975–2000.Ed. Selina Samuels. Farmington Hills: Thomson Gale, 2006: 153–163 She also uses the penname "Alex Juniper".{{cite web |title=Janette Turner Hospital |url=https://www.britannica.com/biography/Janette-Turner-Hospital |website=Britannica |access-date=March 21, 2024}}

Early life and education

Turner was born in Melbourne on November 12, 1942 and grew up in Queensland. She studied at the University of Queensland and Kelvin Grove Teachers College, gaining a BA in 1965. She holds an MA from Queen's University, Canada, 1973."Janette Turner Hospital". Contemporary Literary Criticism, Vol.145, Ed. Jeffrey W Hunter. Detroit: The Gale Group, 2001: 291–321

Career

Turner Hospital published her first story in "Atlantic Monthly" in 1978, and her first novel, The Ivory Swing, in 1982.{{cite web|title= Austlit — Janette Turner Hospital |publisher= Austlit|url=https://www.austlit.edu.au/austlit/page/A18890|access-date= 8 May 2024}}

She also teaches literature and creative writing and has been writer-in-residence at universities in Australia, Canada, England and the United States (MIT, Boston University, Colgate and the University of South Carolina).

She visited the Writer-in-Residence in the MFA program at Columbia University in 2010.{{cite web|title=Janette Turner Hospital |url=http://www.cas.sc.edu/dean/retired/09-10/hospital.html |publisher=University of South Carolina |access-date=30 September 2010 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20101003071802/http://www.cas.sc.edu/dean/retired/09-10/hospital.html |archive-date= 3 October 2010 }}"Janette Turner Hospital". Contemporary Literary Criticism, Vol.145, Ed. Jeffrey W Hunter. Detroit: The Gale Group, 2001: 291–321.

She has published six novels as well as three story collections. Her 2003 novel Due Preparations for the Plague received the Queensland Premier's Award for Fiction.{{Cite web |last=Birnbaum |first=Robert |date=2003-11-11 |title=Janette Turner Hospital - Identity Theory |url=https://www.identitytheory.com/janette-turner-hospital/ |access-date=2023-08-15 |website=www.identitytheory.com |language=en-US}}

Her books, such as Oyster and Due Preparations for the Plague, are published in multiple translations."Janette Turner Hospital". Canadian Who's Who 2005. Ed. Elizabeth Lumley. Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2005: 609.

She is known for her penchant for beginning books with intricate riddles, continues this pattern with her 2014 novel The Claimant , it delves into the complexities of identity, class, and morality against the backdrop of a wealthy Vanderbilt family's fortune.{{Cite web |last=Nielson |first=Lucy |title=Janette Turner Hospital weaves a riddling spell in The Claimant |url=https://www.smh.com.au/entertainment/books/janette-turner-hospital-weaves-a-riddling-spell-in-the-claimant-20140526-zronx.html |website=Sydney Morning Herald}}

Honours and awards

Turner Hospital was awarded an honorary D.Litt. from the University of Queensland, Australia, for "services to Australian Literature".University of Queensland alumni site: {{cite web |url=http://www.alumni.uq.edu.au/janette-turner-hospital-author |title=Janette Turner Hospital, author - Alumni & Community |access-date=2009-11-27 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20090913084852/http://www.alumni.uq.edu.au/janette-turner-hospital-author |archive-date=13 September 2009 |df=dmy-all }} She has won a number of international literary awards, including the Steele Rudd Award for Best Collection of Short Stories, 2012. She was also a finalist (one of five) for Prime Minister's Literary Award for Fiction

and for the Melbourne Age Book of the Year Award for Fiction.

Bibliography

=Novels=

{{cite book |last=Turner Hospital |first=Janette |title=The Ivory Swing |location= |publisher=Hodder & Stoughton |year=1982}}
The Tiger in the Tiger Pit (1983)
Borderline (novel) (1985)
Charades (novel) (1988)
A Very Proper Death, as Alex Juniper (1990)
The Last Magician (1992)
Oyster (1996)
Due Preparations for the Plague (2003)
Orpheus Lost (2007)David Callahan. Rainforest Narratives: The Work of Janette Turner Hospital. St Lucia: University of Queensland Press, 2009
The Claimant (2016)

=Short story collections=

Dislocations (1986)
Isobars (1990)
Collected Stories (1995)
North of Nowhere, South of Loss (2003)
{{Citation |title=Forecast : turbulence |date=2011 |publisher=Fourth Estate |isbn=978-0-7322-9444-1}}

= Selected articles=

{{cite journal |date=December 2019 |title=Missing : in search of missing links |journal=Fryer Folios |publisher=University of Queensland Library |volume=12 |issue=1 |pages=10–21}}

References

= Sources =

Brydon, Diana. "The Stone’s Memory: An Interview with Janette Turner Hospital". Commonwealth Novel in English. 4.1 (1991), pp. 14–23.
McKay, Belinda. "Transformative Moments: An Interview with Janette Turner Hospital". Queensland Review. 11.2 (December 2004), pp. 1–10 [http://search.informit.com.au/fullText;dn=900331631162604;res=IELHSS PDF for purchase]
Critique: Studies in Contemporary Fiction, (ed.) Donald J. Greiner, 48.4 (Summer 2007); [https://www.tandfonline.com/toc/vcrt20/48/4issue dedicated to Janette Turner Hospital]
[http://www.nzherald.co.nz/terrorism/news/article.cfm?c_id=340&objectid=10455525 Sibree, Bron (2007-08-06) "To listen and learn", outline of JTH's career and review of Orpheus Lost, in the online version of the New Zealand Herald] [Accessed 2007-08-28]

External links

{{official website|http://www.janetteturnerhospital.com}}
[http://www.cas.sc.edu/CICA Caught in the Creative Act]
[https://openjournals.library.sydney.edu.au/index.php/JASAL/article/view/9737 Maureen Clark 'Power, Vanishing Acts and Silent Watchers in Janette Turner Hospital's The Last Magician ' JASAL 8 (2008)]
[http://www.nla.gov.au/openpublish/index.php/jasal/article/view/41/62 Bernadette Brennan 'Words of Water: Reading Otherness in Tourmaline and Oyster ' JASAL 3 (2004)]

Category:1942 births

Category:20th-century Australian novelists

Category:Living people

Category:Writers from Queensland

Category:Patrick White Award winners

Category:Australian women novelists

Category:21st-century Australian novelists

Category:20th-century Australian women writers

Category:21st-century Australian women writers

Category:Australian women short story writers

Category:Writers from Melbourne

Category:University of Queensland alumni