Edna O'Brien

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Edna O'Brien (born December 15, 1930) is an Irish novelist and short story writer whose works often revolve around the inner feelings of women, and their problems in relating to men.

[edit] Life and career

Born in Tuamgraney, County Clare, Irish Free State in 1930, a place O'Brien would later describe as "fervid" and "enclosed", Edna O'Brien originally practiced as a chemist, but published her first book, The Country Girls, in 1960. The Country Girls was the first part of a trilogy of novels which also included The Lonely Girl (1962) and Girls in Their Married Bliss (1964). Shortly after their publication, these books were banned and even burned in Ireland.

Her 1970 novel A Pagan Place was about her childhood living in a repressive Irish town. Indeed, her parents were vehemently against all things related to literature, and Edna was very troubled by that fact. In 1981 she wrote a play, Virginia, which was about Virginia Woolf and was staged at the Public Theater in New York in spring 1985. Another notable work was a biography of James Joyce, released in 1999.

She has received numerous awards for her works, including a Kingsley Amis Award in 1962, and the Los Angeles Times Book Prize in 1990 for Lantern Slides.

She was married, against her parents' wishes, to the Jewish Czechoslovakian-born writer Ernest Gebler, with whom she had two sons; they ultimately divorced and Gebler died in 1998. Currently, O'Brien travels extensively but lives and works in London. In 2006 Edna O' Brien was appointed adjunct professor of English Literature in University College Dublin [1].

[edit] Selected bibliography

The Country Girls Trilogy (1987), collected with new epilogue, ISBN 0-14-010984-6
- The Country Girls (1960), ISBN 0-14-001851-4
- Girl with Green Eyes (1962), first published as The Lonely Girl, ISBN 0-14-002108-6
- Girls in Their Married Bliss (1964), ISBN 0-14-002649-5
August Is a Wicked Month (1965), ISBN 0-14-002720-3
Casualties of Peace (1966), ISBN 0-14-002875-7
The Love Object (1968), ISBN 0-14-003104-9
A Pagan Place (1970), ISBN 0-297-00027-6
Zee & Co. (1971), ISBN 0-297-00336-4
Night (1972), ISBN 0-297-99541-3
A Scandalous Woman and Other Stories (1974), ISBN 0-297-76735-6
Mother Ireland (1976), ISBN 0-297-77110-8
Johnny I Hardly Knew You (1977), ISBN 0-297-77284-8
Mrs Reinhardt and Other Stories (1978), ISBN 0-297-77476-X
Some Irish Loving (1979), translations, ISBN 0-297-77581-2
Returning (1982), short stories, ISBN 0-297-78052-2
A Fanatic Heart (1985), short stories, ISBN 0-297-78607-5
The High Road (1988), ISBN 0-297-79493-0
On the Bone (1989), poetry, ISBN 0-906887-38-0
Lantern Slides (1990), short stories ISBN 0-297-84019-3
Time and Tide (1992), ISBN 0-670-84552-3
House of Splendid Isolation (1994), ISBN 0-297-81460-5
Down by the River (1996), ISBN 0-297-81806-6
James Joyce (1999), biography, ISBN 0-297-84243-9
Wild Decembers (1999), ISBN 0-297-64576-5
In the Forest (2002), ISBN 0-297-60732-4
The Light of Evening (2006), ISBN 0-618-71876-2