Jeanette Winterson

JW , writing in the late twentieth and the twenty-first centuries, has been acclaimed by some critics and savaged by others for her provocative and outspoken novels, in which she uncompromisingly confronts cultural notions of gender identity, sexuality, and religion. She attempts to change the world through her writing in the manner of but in place of political activism. Her work is widely studied and celebrated by feminist and lesbian readers and critics. Characteristically, she blends many genres: fable, fairytale, fantasy, history, philosophy, lesbian writing, science fiction, magic realism, and scientific studies. She is fond of stories in which the characters are on a journey together.

Milestones

27 August 1959

JW was born in Manchester; she was given up for adoption.
Who’s Who. Adam and Charles Black.
Kester-Shelton, Pamela, editor. Feminist Writers. St James Press.

21 March 1985

JW published her first novel, a semi-autobiographical coming-of-age story of a young lesbian, Oranges Are Not the Only Fruit.
Hinds, Hilary. “Oranges Are Not the Only Fruit: Reaching Audiences Other Lesbian Texts Cannot Reach”. New Lesbian Criticism: Literary and Cultural Readings, edited by Sally Munt, Harvester Wheatsheaf, pp. 153-72.
154

After April 1985

JW 's Oranges Are Not the Only Fruit won both the Publishing for People Award and the Whitbread Award for best first novel from the Booksellers Association of Great Britain and Ireland .
Contemporary Authors. Gale Research.
58

January 1990

The television adaptation of JW 's first novel, Oranges Are Not the Only Fruit, was transmitted in three episodes on BBC Television ; the script was published the same year.
Winterson, Jeanette. Oranges Are Not the Only Fruit: Adapted from her novel by Jeanette Winterson. Pandora.
cast list

Biography

Birth and Development

27 August 1959

JW was born in Manchester; she was given up for adoption.
Who’s Who. Adam and Charles Black.
Kester-Shelton, Pamela, editor. Feminist Writers. St James Press.