Carol Shields

Carol Shields studied at Hanover College, the University of Exeter in England, and the University of Ottawa, where she received an M.A. In 1957 she married Donald Hugh Shields, a professor of Civil Engineering, and moved to Canada. Carol Shields lived in Canada until her death in Victoria, BC, in July 2003. In addition to raising five children, all of whom are now grown, Shields has worked as an editorial assistant for the journal Canadian Slavonic Papers and as a professor at the University of Ottawa, the University of British Columbia, and the University of Manitoba, where she has taught for eighteen years. In 1996, Carol Shields was appointed Chancellor of the University of Winnipeg. Shields is the author of several novels, plays, and short-story collections, including The Orange Fish, Swann, Various Miracles, Happenstance, Thirteen Hands, and The Republic of Love. Her books have won a Canada Council Major Award, a National Magazine Award, the Canadian Author's Award, and a CBC short story award. The Stone Diaries won the National Book Critics Circle Award, 1994, the Pulitzer Prize, 1995, and Canada's Governor General Award, 1993. It was also named one of the best books of the year by Publishers Weekly and a Notable Book by The New York Times Book Review. Carol Shields' Larry's Party won the Orange Prize in 1998. Shields' biography of Jane Austen received the Charles Taylor Prize for Literary Non-Fiction in 2002. A labyrinth was built in Winnipeg in Carol Shields' honor.