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Автор Маргарет Этвуд

The Author

MARGARET ATWOOD was born in Ottawa, Ontario, in 1939. During her childhood she spent many summers in the bush country of northern Ontario and Quebec. Upon graduation from the University of Toronto in 1961, she took her master’s degree from Radcliffe College the following year and went on to pursue doctoral studies at Harvard University.

Novelist and poet, critic and editor, Atwood is one of the most prolific and important writers of contemporary literature. Equally acclaimed as a writer of both fiction and poetry, she devotes much of her creative energy to giving literary shape to the aspirations, fears, and foibles of her society. Her many honours include the Governor General’s Award for Poetry, the Governor General’s Award for Fiction, the Los Angeles Times Fiction Award, the Giller Prize for Fiction, the Booker Prize, and several honorary degrees.

Margaret Atwood resides in Toronto, Ontario.

THE NEW CANADIAN LIBRARY

General Editor: David Staines

ADVISORY BOARD

Alice Munro

W. H. New

Guy Vanderhaeghe

First published in 1983 by Coach House Press

New Canadian Library edition 1997

All rights reserved. The use of any part of this publication reproduced, transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, or stored in a retrieval system, without the prior written consent of the publisher – or, in case of photocopying or other reprographic copying, a licence from the Canadian Copyright Licensing Agency – is an infringement of the copyright law.

Library and Archives Canada Cataloguing in Publication

Atwood, Margaret, 1939–

Murder in the dark : short fictions and prose poems

(New Canadian library)

eISBN: 978-1-55199-553-3

I. Title. II.

Series.

PS8501. T86M871997 C813’. 54 C97-930817-6

PR9199. 3. A88M87 1997

Some of these pieces have appeared in Adam, Bread & Roses, Exile, Fireweed, Island, Littfass, Liturataz, The Lunatic Gazette, Quest, Tamarack Review, This Magazine, Time Out, and Toronto Life; some have been broadcast on the CBC programme Anthology.

The author wishes to thank the Guggenheim Foundation for helping to provide time.

We acknowledge the financial support of the Government of Canada through the Book Publishing Industry Development Program and that of the Government of Ontario through the Ontario Media Development Corporation’s Ontario Book Initiative. We further acknowledge the support of the Canada Council for the Arts and the Ontario Arts Council for our publishing program.

McClelland & Stewart Ltd.

75 Sherbourne Street

Toronto, Ontario

M5A 2P9

v3. 1

Contents

Cover

The Author

Title Page

Autobiography

Making Poison

The Boys’ Own Annual, 1911

Before the War

Horror Comics

Boyfriends

The Victory Burlesk

Fainting

II.

Raw Materials

III.

Murder in the Dark

Simmering

Women’s Novels

Happy Endings

Bread

The Page

IV.

Mute

She

Worship

Iconography

Liking Men

Strawberries

Him

Hopeless