Clark Blaise Biography
(1940– ), Lunar Attractions, Lusts, A North American Education, Tribal Justice, Resident Alien
Canadian novelist and short-story writer, born in Fargo, North Dakota, educated at Denison University and the University of lowa. Since 1964, when he began lecturing at the University of Wisconsin, Blaise has held a succession of posts at universities throughout North America. He became a Canadian citizen in 1973. The autobiographical dimension in much of his highly regarded fiction is integral to his treatments of the impermanence and relativity of personal identity. His novels, Lunar Attractions (1979) and Lusts (1983), respectively form a moving account of confused adolescence and an obsessive rehearsal of the significances of a wife's suicide. His short-stories in A North American Education (1973), Tribal Justice (1974), and Resident Alien (1986) are widely considered to represent his central achievement. I Had A Father: A Post-Modern Autobiography appeared in 1993. With his wife Bharati Mukerjee, Blaise is the co-author of Days and Nights in Calcutta (1977), a journal of their year in India, and The Sorrow and the Terror: the Haunting Legacy of the Air India Tragedy (1987).
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Literature Reference: American Literature, English Literature, Classics & Modern FictionEncyclopedia of Literature: Bible in English to [Thomas] Edward Bond Biography