Robin McGrath (born March 29, 1949) is a Canadian writer from St. John's,

Newfoundland and Labrador Newfoundland and Labrador (; french: Terre-Neuve-et-Labrador; frequently abbreviated as NL) is the easternmost province of Canada, in the country's Atlantic region. The province comprises the island of Newfoundland and the continental region ...

.Aaron Peach
"Robin McGrath (1949-)"
''Heritage Newfoundland and Labrador'', 2006.

Early career

The daughter of former Newfoundland politician James McGrath, she completed a Ph.D. in English literature at the

University of Western Ontario The University of Western Ontario (UWO), also known as Western University or Western, is a public research university in London, Ontario, Canada. The main campus is located on of land, surrounded by residential neighbourhoods and the Thames Ri ...

, and later taught at the

University of Alberta The University of Alberta, also known as U of A or UAlberta, is a public research university located in Edmonton, Alberta, Canada. It was founded in 1908 by Alexander Cameron Rutherford,"A Gentleman of Strathcona – Alexander Cameron Ruth ...

. During her academic career, she also wrote for the ''

London Free Press ''The London Free Press'' is a daily newspaper based in London, Ontario, Canada. It has the largest circulation of any newspaper in Southwestern Ontario. History ''The London Free Press'' began as the ''Canadian Free Press'', founded by Willi ...

'' and the ''

Edmonton Journal The ''Edmonton Journal'' is a daily newspaper in Edmonton, Alberta. It is part of the Postmedia Network. History The ''Journal'' was founded in 1903 by three local businessmen — John Macpherson, Arthur Moore and J.W. Cunningham — as ...

'', and published ''Canadian Inuit Literature: The Development of a Tradition'', one of the first-ever academic studies of

Inuit Inuit (; iu, ᐃᓄᐃᑦ 'the people', singular: Inuk, , dual: Inuuk, ) are a group of culturally similar indigenous peoples inhabiting the Arctic and subarctic regions of Greenland, Labrador, Quebec, Nunavut, the Northwest Territories, ...

oral literary traditions. She left academia and returned to St. John's in 1993 to pursue creative writing.

Writing career

She published the short fiction collection ''Trouble and Desire'' in 1996, which was a Newfoundland and Labrador Book Award nominee in 1998. ''Escaped Domestics'', her first poetry collection, followed in 1998. The book was a

J. M. Abraham Poetry Award The J.M. Abraham Poetry Award, formerly known as the Atlantic Poetry Prize, is a Canadian literary award, presented annually by the Atlantic Book Awards & Festival, to the best work of poetry published by a writer from the Atlantic provinces. Win ...

nominee, and won a

Canadian Jewish Book Award The Helen and Stan Vine Canadian Jewish Book Awards were a Canadian program of literary awards, managed, produced and presented annually by the Koffler Centre of the Arts to works judged to be the year's best works of literature by Jewish Canadia ...

for poetry in 1999. In 1999 she published the young adult novel ''Hoist Your Sails and Run''. The book was a nominee for the Ann Connor Brimer Award in 2001. In 2002, the Resource Centre for the Arts staged her theatrical play ''A Mountain of Shoes'', about a young

Holocaust The Holocaust, also known as the Shoah, was the genocide of European Jews during World War II. Between 1941 and 1945, Nazi Germany and its collaborators systematically murdered some six million Jews across German-occupied Europe; ...

survivor who settles in Newfoundland, and she published the novel ''Donovan's Station''. The novel was a

Commonwealth Writers Prize Commonwealth Foundation presented a number of prizes between 1987 and 2011. The main award was called the Commonwealth Writers' Prize and was composed of two prizes: the Best Book Prize (overall and regional) was awarded from 1987 to 2011; the Bes ...

nominee for Canada and the Caribbean in 2003. In 2005 she published the poetry collection ''Covenant of Salt'', for which she received another J.M. Abraham Poetry Award nomination in 2006. Her 2009 novel ''The Winterhouse'' won a Canadian Jewish Book Award for fiction in 2010. She has also published the novels ''Gone to the Ice'' (2003), and ''Livyers World'' (2007) and the non-fiction books ''Salt Fish and Shmattes: The History of the Jews in Newfoundland and Labrador from 1770'' (2006), a history of the Jewish community in Newfoundland and Labrador, and ''Life on the Mista Shipu: Dispatches from Labrador'' (2018).Sal Sawler
"10 Hot New Books to Fuel Your Winter"
''Atlantic Books'', November 29, 2018.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:McGrath, Robin 1949 births Living people 20th-century Canadian short story writers 20th-century Canadian novelists 20th-century Canadian non-fiction writers 20th-century Canadian women writers 21st-century Canadian short story writers 21st-century Canadian novelists 21st-century Canadian non-fiction writers 21st-century Canadian dramatists and playwrights 21st-century Canadian women writers Canadian women short story writers Canadian women novelists Canadian women non-fiction writers Canadian women dramatists and playwrights Jewish Canadian writers University of Western Ontario alumni Academic staff of the University of Alberta Writers from St. John's, Newfoundland and Labrador