Endings - Betty Jane Wylie

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Résumé :
Betty Jane Wylie's Endings is not to be taken lightly, though its tone is deceptively light and its style lively and conversational. She extracts interesting anecdotes and observations from her long, well-lived life and asks serious questions: How do we live as old people? As old women? What can we expect? How do we handle the time that is left? Eighty-eight year old Wylie tackles these subjects thoughtfully, but also with humour and charm. You won't just enjoy this book; if you're approaching this stage of life, you will find it both salutary and richly entertaining. Endings is a valuable contribution to the literature about and by aging people. - Sharon Butala Short-listed three times for a Governor-General's Award; author of Season of Fury and Wonder. While demographic studies tell of our aging population, most people--and governments-barely acknowledge this shift. Shortly before his death in 43 B.C., the Roman writer Cicero meditated on old age in De Senectute, a classic recently translated as How to Grow Old. This challenging subject now occupies many contemporary writers in their so-called 'golden years', with popular new memoirs from Diana Athill, Donald Hall and Roger Angel offering intimate accounts of their dilemmas and solutions. In Endings: A Book for Almost Everyone, Betty Jane Wylie, the Canadian non-fiction writer, playwright and blogger, adds her warm-hearted but wry voice to an important growing genre. Admirers of Wylie's work will recognize her compassionate approach to life's struggles, while readers new to her will enjoy the frank, hard-won wisdom of a woman who looks at life clear-eyed. Old age, she tells us, takes 'guts and grace', which is also a good description of this memoir. - Richard Teleky, Professor of Humanities at York University and author of Ordinary Paradise: Essays on Art and Culture

Biographie:
Bettyjane Wylie is a much-published author, poet, librettist, lyricist and playwright, and, since 2015, a blogger. Over three dozen of her plays have been professionally produced,about 20 of which have been published by Playwrights Press, Black Moss Press and Red Deer College Press. Her books include biography, financial planning, self-help, belles lettres, poetry and cookbooks, with a number of different publishers. She has been writer-in-residence at several libraries in Canada and as such has conducted writing workshops, including playwriting. She has a B.A. (Double Honours) in English and French, an M.A. in English (20th century poetry) and a D.Litt.from the University of Manitoba, and was a fellow of The Bunting Institute at Radcliffe/Harvard, where she wrote a play about a diarist, Alice James. She also has an Order of Canada (2003). She is very old.