Alice Munro

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Alice Munro 1931–, Canadian writer. Much acclaimed as one of the finest contemporary short-story writers, Munro is known for quiet, insightfully realistic, and irony-tinged works dealing with daily life, written in an elegantly unobtrusive prose. These tales are mainly about the lives of girls and women, are often set in rural Ontario, and frequently concern the conflicts between independence and domesticity, creativity and obligation. Other recurring themes in her fiction include the interrelatedness of poverty and shame, the subtleties of class distinctions, the intricacies of women's sexuality, and the complex problems of the female artist. Collections of her many stories include Dance of the Happy Shades (1968), Something I've Been Meaning to Tell You (1974), The Beggar Maid (1979), The Progress of Love (1986), Friend of My Youth (1990), The Love of a Good Woman (1998), Hateship, Friendship, Courtship, Loveship, Marriage (2001), Runaway (2004), Carried Away (2006), and Too Much Happiness (2009). The stories in The View from Castle Rock (2006) mingle fiction, history, and memoir, tracing Munro's family from 17th-century Scotland to modern Canada. She also has written one novel, Lives of Girls and Women (1971). Munro was awarded the 2009 Man Booker International Prize.

Bibliography: See biography by E. D. Blodgett (1988); biographical memoir, Lives of Mothers and Daughters: Growing Up with Alice Munro (2001) by her daughter, S. Munro; studies by L. K. MacKendrick, ed. (1983), H. Dahlie (1984), W. R. Martin (1987), I. de P. Carrington (1989), J. Carscallen (1993), A. Heble (1994), C. A. Howells (1998), R. Thacker, ed. (1999), and J. McCaig (2002).

Munro, Alice (1931– ), Canadian short story writer, born in Wingham, Ontario, where she grew up. She spent two years at the University of Ontario, married, and moved to British Columbia. Each of her collections, Dance of the Happy Shades (1968), Who Do You Think You Are? (1978; UK title: The Beggar Maid), and The Progress of Love (1986), won the Governor General's Award. Her other collections include Friends of My Youth, Lives of Girls and Women (1973), and Open Secrets (1994). Munro describes herself as writing about ‘places where your roots are’, in her case, small-town southern Ontario, whose texture and unremarkable lives engage her imaginative sympathy. Her mastery of the short story form is superb, and combines poetic intensity and economy with the surprising scope and depth of a novel.