Fonds includes material that documents her literary career up to 1995 and includes diaries and notebooks; professional correspondence; published works; articles and reviews; photographs and drawings; critical reception, publicity, and promotional material. The second accession includes the various drafts of "Away", as well as, documents relating to her growing list of professional activities. 2016-0136 accession contains professional and personal correspondence; research material, notes, drafts and proofs and promotion for Urquhart's novels (The Whirlpool, Away, Changing Heaven, The Underpainter, The Stone Carvers, A Map of Glass, and Sanctuary Line) as well as poetry (The Little Flowers of Madame de Montespan) and an anthology Four Square Garden; family letters and photographs, juvenilia and diary; clippings and certificates. Arranged into the following series: Correspondence; Personal Writing and Documents; Series Manuscripts; Professional Activities; Adaptations of the Work of Jane Urquhart; and Work by Other Writers.
Urquhart, Jane, 1949- : Novelist and poet, Jane Urquhart, was born in Geraldton, Ontario in 1949. She received from the University of Guelph a B.A. in English in 1971 and a B.A. in Art History in 1976. Her earliest publications were of poetry, "I'm Walking in the Garden of His Imaginary Palace" (1982), her first published work, was a collaborative effort with her husband artist Tony Urquhart. Her first novel, "The Whirlpool" (1986), links the stories of three 19th century Canadians through use of the symbol of the whirlpool. "The Whirlpool" is the first Canadian book to win France's prestigious Prix de meilleur livre étranger (Best Foreign Book Award). Through its success, Urquhart gained significant national and international prominence as an author. Her novel "Away" (1993), encompasses aspects of both Irish and Canadian history as told through the lives of four generations of women. She has earned a reputation as a major Canadian novelist whose ability to incorporate Canadian history into present-day narratives is superlative. Her fourth novel, "The Underpainter" (1997) received the Governor General's Literary Award for fiction. Other honours include the Marian Engel Award (1994) for an outstanding body of prose written by a Canadian woman. In 1996 she was named a Chevalier dans l'Ordre des Arts et des Lettres in France. As a reviewer for the "Globe and Mail" and various literary journals, her opinion is widely sought. She has been a writer-in-residence at the University of Ottawa, Memorial University and the University of Toronto.
1993-01 LMS
1998-01 LMS
2002-10 LMS
