'Words are our life'

 

“Words are our life. We are human because we use language. So I think we are less human when we use less language.” – Carol Shields

 

Born in Oak Park, IL on June 2, 1935 Shields grew up in America but spent much of her adult life in Canada.  She was a full-time writing professor, novelist, playwright and short story writer and won both the Pulitzer Prize and Canada’s equivalent, The Governor General’s Award, for her novel The Stone Diaries – the only writer to ever win both awards for the same book.   She died from cancer in 2003.

 

Shields’ short story collections, including Various Miracles and Dressing Up for the Carnival, also were much-honored and are part of the Collected Stories of Carol Shields published after her death.   Her nonfiction book on author Jane Austin also won several major awards.   And her plays, particularly "Departures and Arrivals" and "Thirteen Hands" have been performed countless times by amateur and professional theater companies around the globe.

 

Shields was an advocate of using life experiences in writing, but only selectively.  “There are chapters in every life which are seldom read,” she explained, “and certainly not aloud.”