Helen Weinzweig (1915–2010), née Tenenbaum, was a Canadian writer."Helen Weinzweig, Toronto author of surreal fiction, dead at age 94"
''

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'', February 16, 2010. The author of two novels and a short story collection, her novel ''Basic Black with Pearls'' won the Toronto Book Award in 1981, and her short story collection ''A View from the Roof'' was a shortlisted nominee for the

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in 1915 to parents hailing from near

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, she emigrated to Canada at age nine with her mother, and married composer

John Weinzweig John Jacob Weinzweig (March 11, 1913 – August 24, 2006) was a composer, teacher, and advocate of contemporary Canadian concert music. Born in Toronto, Weinzweig went to Harbord Collegiate Institute, then studied music at the University of Tor ...

on July 12, 1940. She published her first short story, "Surprise!", in ''

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'' in 1967, and her

debut novel A debut novel is the first novel a novelist publishes. Debut novels are often the author's first opportunity to make an impact on the publishing industry, and thus the success or failure of a debut novel can affect the ability of the author to pu ...

''Passing Ceremony'' was published in 1973. She came to be regarded as one of Canada's first important

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writers. Her style was marked by experimental forms with some aspects of

metafiction Metafiction is a form of fiction that emphasizes its own narrative structure in a way that inherently reminds the audience that they are reading or viewing a fictional work. Metafiction is self-conscious about language, literary form, and story ...

; in her short story "Journey to Porquis", a writer on a train trip realizes that all of his fellow passengers are characters in his novel. In the early 1980s, with the encouragement of director and producer Rina Fraticelli, the theatre artist Pol Pelletier adapted Weinzweig's short story ''My Mother’s Luck'' for the English language stage. Pelletier incarnated the Mother in productions in Montréal (at the ''Théâtre expérimental des femmes''), Toronto, Ottawa, and Hamilton. Several of Weinzweig's short stories in ''A View from the Roof'' were later adapted for stage and

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broadcast by playwright Dave Carley."Helen Weinzweig (1915 - 2010)"

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, April 1, 2010. Weinzweig died in 2010, aged 94.

Works

* ''Passing Ceremony'' (1973) * ''Basic Black with Pearls'' (1981) ** in German, transl. Brigitte Jakobeit: ''Schwarzes Kleid mit Perlen''. Wagenbach, Berlin 2019 * ''My mother's luck'' (1983) * ''A View from the Roof'' (1989) * ''Nero e perle'' (1994)

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References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Weinzweig, Helen 1915 births 2010 deaths Canadian women novelists Canadian women dramatists and playwrights Novelists from Toronto 20th-century Canadian novelists 20th-century Canadian dramatists and playwrights Jewish Canadian writers Polish emigrants to Canada Canadian feminist writers Canadian women short story writers 20th-century Canadian women writers 20th-century Canadian short story writers

Works

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References