Meet Margaret Atwood

Margaret Eleanor Atwood was born in Ottawa, Ontario, Canada on November 18, 1939. Her parents, Carl and Margaret Atwood had three children, Margaret Atwood being the second. Through the way Atwood was raised, her writing was heavily influenced. Her father, Carl Atwood, was an entomologist who studied insects in the forests of Margaret’s childhood. She spent most of the time exploring and observing the beauty of nature along with her father. This part of her childhood could be seen through many works through the imagery and depth of Margaret’s works that she creates through her life, shown through her advocacy of the environment. 

Margaret Atwood pursued a higher education in her life to seek a knowledgeable level of her understanding for writing. Atwood attended The University of Toronto’s Victoria College receiving her bachelor’s degree for English in 1961. Her career was already taken off in the same year she enrolled because of the popularity of her first work, Double Persephone (1961). Later in 1962 she received her master’s degrees at The Harvard Radcliffe College, a prestigious school with a 2.4% acceptance rate; a major switch from The University of Toronto’s Victoria College 100% acceptance rate. She continued to pursue her doctorate when Atwood later was enrolled at Harvard University for English, however for unknown reasons Atwood pulled back from the program before finishing. Margaret Atwood’s impressive schooling created a basis of respect for her already skilled writing. 

Margret Atwood has led a highly successful and rewarding career through her life. She has written several award winning novels, poetry, and short stories, such as The Circle Game (1966), The Handmaid’s Tale (1985), The Blind Assassin (2000), Oryx and Crake (2003), and The Tent (2006). Atwood’s famous works have been translated in many different languages and have had several in screen adaptations with The Handmaid’s Tale and Alias Grace. These adaptations of her works allow for people all around the world to enjoy her works expanding her audience throughout the world. She, too, has received several awards for her novels in her life as an author. Along with the television series adaptation, the Governor General’s Award was awarded to her book The Handmaid’s Tale. The Commonwealth Literary Prize was also awarded for not the success of The Handmaid’s Tale but for the beauty and diverseness of Atwood’s writing. She was presented with her first Man Booker Prize in 2005 for The Blind Assassin after not receiving the award for her many nominations with The Handmaid’s Tale, Cat’s Eye, and Alias Grace, and Oryx and Crake in previous years. Later, she received, once again, another Booker Prize in her work of The Testament. Her accomplishments continue as she was awarded in the year 1993 for her writing of the The Robber Bride with The Canadian Authors’ Association Award. Margaret Atwood obtained several honorary degrees from many prestigious colleges such as: Cambridge, Oxford, and the National University of Ireland in Galway. Along with her recognition in 1990 when Harvard awarded her the Graduate School of Arts and Sciences Centennial Medal. In 1991, 1993, and 1995, she was given the Trillium Book Award. Most recently in 2005, The Edinburgh International Book Festival awarded her the Enlightenment Award. 

Double Persephone, Margaret Atwood’s first released writing, heavily focuses on the juxtaposition of  “the flux of life or nature and the fixity of man’s artificial creations” that is seen in many more of her future works. In her work of Speeches for Doctor Frankenstein, she delves into the cause and effect that people inflict on not only themselves but to other people. In Handmaid’s Tale, a timeless dystopian novel set in a world that may feel uncomfortably realistic to the female readers of the book describing the issue involving the freedom of a women’s reproductive system and why it isn’t morally and politically right for the government to control. Cat’s Eye, a novel written by Atwood in 1988, faces the challenge of seeking through the uncertainties and grief of  trauma. Bodily Harm is a novel that writes of the topic of sexual harassment experienced in  Toronto comparing the the oppressive ideals of sexual and political beliefs experienced on a Caribbean island. Margaret Atwood faces real life problems of the world through many of her works, proving that her writing faces important issues that must be addressed in order for them to not be fixed, but recognized. 

Besides writing, Atwood has invested some of her time working at a marketing research firm. She also finds herself combining her passion of education and English by teaching at several colleges in Vancouver, Edmonton, Montreal, and Toronto. Jim Polk was Atwood’s partner from 1968 to 1973. However, Atwood today isn’t alone, Graeme Gibson, together with her “soul-mate” they presently live on a farm north from Toronto with their daughter Elenor Jess Atwood who was born in 1976. Atwood and Graeme Gibson are both writers and are said to build and grow their writings together.