The author was a novelist, poet, and short-story writer whose literary career spanned almost the entire twentieth century. Born and educated in Chicago, she lived in California for most of her adult life and taught at both Stanford University and the University of California at Berkeley. This book tells her story.
The Wife of Martin Guerre-based on a notorious trial in sixteenth-century France-is "one of the most significant short novels in English" (Atlantic Monthly). Originally published in 1941, it still raises questions about identity, belonging, and about an individual's capacity to act within an inflexible system.
