Jane Hyatt Yolen
, b. 1939
Jane Hyatt Yolen is a celebrated and prolific writer of children’s stories, as well as fantasy, science fiction and poetry for adult readers. She was born in New York to intellectual parents. Her family lived in various parts of the east coast of the USA during her childhood. Yolen was a conscientious student and wrote poetry, stories and journalism throughout her youth. Her enduring association with the Society of Friends was established at Indianbrook, a Quaker summer camp in Vermont. After completing college, she returned to New York and began work as an editor in the children’s book division of Alfred A. Knopf and for the Saturday Review before turning to writing. Her first children’s book, Pirates in Petticoats (1963) was released on her 22nd birthday, and she has since published over 300 books. Her work has won numerous awards and she has received six honourary doctorates in literature, and called ‘the Hans Christian Andersen of America and the Aesop of the twentieth century’ (Author’s website).
In addition to Wings, Yolen has published a number of other retellings of Greek myth, including Pegasus, the Flying Horse (1998). The Young Heroes series, written in collaboration with Robert J. Harris, features Odysseus in the Serpent Maze (2001), Hippolyta and the Curse of the Amazons (2002) Atalanta and the Arcadian Beast (2003), and Jason and the Gorgon’s Blood (2004).
Source:
An Introduction to Jane Yolen (1939-), Children's Literature Review, edited by Dana Ferguson, vol. 149, Gale, 2010. Children's Literature Review Online (accessed January 19, 2018).
Bio prepared by Miriam Riverlea, University of New England, mriverlea@gmail.com
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