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Jane Yolen

Jane Hyatt Yolen (born February 11, 1939) is an American writer of fantasy, science fiction, and children's books. She is the author or editor of more than 350 books, of which the best known is The Devil's Arithmetic, a Holocaust novella.[1][2] Her other works include the Nebula Award−winning short story "Sister Emily's Lightship", the novelette "Lost Girls", Owl Moon, The Emperor and the Kite, and the Commander Toad series. She has collaborated on works with all three of her children, most extensively with Adam Stemple.[1]

Jane Yolen

(1939-02-11) February 11, 1939
New York City, U.S.

Writer, poet

Smith College

1960s–present

Fantasy, science fiction, folklore, children's fiction

Yolen delivered the inaugural Alice G. Smith Lecture at the University of South Florida in 1989. In 2012 she became the first woman to give the Andrew Lang lecture.[3] Yolen published her 400th book in early 2021, Bear Outside.[4]

Early life[edit]

Jane Hyatt Yolen was born on February 11, 1939, at Beth Israel Medical Center in Manhattan. She is the first child of Isabell Berlin Yolen, a psychiatric social worker who became a full-time mother and homemaker upon Yolen's birth, and Will Hyatt Yolen, a journalist who wrote columns at the time for New York newspapers,[5] and whose family emigrated from the Ukraine to the United States.[1] Isabell also did volunteer work, and wrote short stories in her spare time. However, she was not able to sell them. Because the Hyatts, the family of Yolen's grandmother, Mina Hyatt Yolen, only had girls, a number of the children of Yolen's generation were given their last name as a middle name in order to perpetuate it.[5]


When Yolen was barely one year old, the family moved to California to accommodate Will's new job working for Hollywood film studios, doing publicity on films such as American Tragedy and Knut Rockne. The family moved back to New York City prior to the birth of Yolen's brother, Steve. When Will joined the Army as a Second Lieutenant to fight in England during World War II, Yolen, her mother and brother lived with her grandparents, Danny and Dan, in Newport News, Virginia. After the war, the family moved back to Manhattan, living on Central Park West and 97th Street until Yolen turned 13. She attended PS 93, where she enjoyed writing and singing, and became friends with future radio presenter Susan Stamberg. She also engaged writing by creating a newspaper for her apartment with her brother that she sold for five cents a copy. She was accepted to Music and Art High School. During the summer prior to that semester, she attended a Vermont summer camp, which was her first involvement with the Society of Friends (Quakers). Her family also moved to a ranch house in Westport, Connecticut, where she attended Bedford Junior high for ninth grade, and then Staples High School.[5] She received a BA from Smith College in 1960 and a master's degree in Education from the University of Massachusetts in 1978.[1] After graduating she moved back to New York City.[5]

Personal life[edit]

In 1962, Yolen married David W. Stemple. They had three children, including musician Adam Stemple, and six grandchildren. David Stemple died in March 2006. Yolen lives in Hatfield, Massachusetts. She also owns a house in Scotland, where she lives for a few months each year.[1][5]

1987 Special World Fantasy Award (for Favorite Folktales From Around the World)

[8]

1989 for Older Readers (for The Devil's Arithmetic) [9][10]

Sydney Taylor Book Award

1992 The Catholic Library Association's (for her body of children's literature)[11][12]

Regina Medal

1999 Nebula Award for Novelette (for "Lost Girls")

[13]

2009 at the 2010 World Fantasy Convention. A panel of judges selects about two people annually.[8][13]

World Fantasy Award for Life Achievement

2017 [14]

Damon Knight Memorial Grand Master Award

Edit this at Wikidata

Official website

Yolen's writing journal

at the Comic Book DB (archived from the original)

Jane Yolen

on SciFan

Bibliography

by RoseEtta Stone (underdown.org)

2001 interview and review of Briar Rose

2007 interview by Childrensbookradio

2017 interview by The Portalist

[usurped]

Biography at Endicott Studio

by Rita Berman Frischer, Encyclopedia, Jewish Women's Archive

Biography

at Library of Congress, with 359 library catalog records

Jane Yolen