Bearing Witness To Her World

“Writing is far too hard work to say what someone else wants me to. Serving it as a craft, using it as a way of growing in my own understanding, seems to me to be a beautiful way to live. And if that product is shareable with other people, so much the better.” – Jane Rule

Born in New Jersey on March 28, 1931, Rule studied writing at  Mills College in California, spent time working and living in England and then taught for a time in Massachusetts before relocating to Canada for the final 50 years of her life.  

                   Her first novel, Desert of the Heart, was rejected 22 times before being published in 1964 and establishing her as both a major writer and key spokesperson for gay rights.  In 1985 the book was adapted into an award-winning movie Desert Hearts.  

 

From 1964 to her death in 2007 Rule authored another dozen novels and numerous essays, served on the executive committee of the Writers' Union of Canada, and earned a basketfull of writing prizes, including two lifetime achievement awards.

“Every artist seems to me to have the job of bearing witness to the world we live in,” Rule once said.  “To some extent I think of all of us as artists, because we have voices and we are each of us unique.”

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