Margaret Atwood

Canadian writer, a poet and novelist who first came to prominence in the late 1960s. Atwood's first volume of poetry, The Circle Game," 1966 and her first novel, "The Edible Woman" commenced a prestigious career. In 1983 she compiled "The New Oxford Book of Canadian Verse in English." Her themes were mainly the emotional interdependence of the sexes and their search for self-discovery, as exemplified in "The Handsmaid's Tale," 1985, in which the sole function of the heroine is to breed. Atwood won the Booker Prize in 2000 for "The Blind Assassin," which was on the best-seller list for the year.