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Dislocations
Hospital's characters are exiles who share an intimate knowledge of dislocation, whether in culture, geography, or self-understanding.
- GenresShort StoriesFiction
Hardcover
First published September 6, 1986
3 people are currently reading
39 people want to read
About the author
Janette Turner Hospital
30 books79 followersBorn in 1942, Janette Turner Hospital grew up on the steamy sub-tropical coast of Australia in the north-eastern state of Queensland. She began her teaching career in remote Queensland high schools, but since her graduate studies she has taught in universities in Australia, Canada, England, France and the United States.
Her first published short story appeared in the Atlantic Monthly (USA) where it won an 'Atlantic First' citation in 1978. Her first novel, The Ivory Swing (set in the village in South India where she lived in l977) won Canada's $50,000 Seal Award in l982. She lived for many years in Canada and in 1986 she was listed as by the Toronto Globe & Mail as one of Canada's 'Ten Best Young Fiction Writers'. Since then she has won a number of prizes for her eight novels and four short story collections and her work has been published in multiple foreign language collections. Three of her short stories appeared in Britain's annual Best Short Stories in English in their year of publication and one of these, 'Unperformed Experiments Have No Results', was selected for The Best of the Best, an anthology of the decade in l995.
The Last Magician, her fifth novel, was listed by Publishers' Weekly as one of the 12 best novels published in 1992 in the USA and was a New York Times 'Notable Book of the Year'. Oyster, her sixth novel, was a finalist for Australia's Miles Franklin Prize Award and for Canada's Trillium Award, and in England it was listed in 'Best Books of the Year' by The Observer, which noted "Oyster is a tour de force… Turner Hospital is one of the best female novelists writing in English." In the USA, Oyster was a New York Times 'Notable Book of the Year'.
Due Preparations for the Plague won the Queensland Premier's Literary Award in 2003, the Davitt Award from Sisters in Crime for "best crime novel of the year by an Australian woman”, and was shortlisted for the Christina Stead Award. In 2003, Hospital received the Patrick White Award, as well as a Doctor of Letters honoris causa from the University of Queensland.
Orpheus Lost, her most recent novel, was one of five finalists for the $110,000 Australia-Asia Literary prize in 2008.
Orpheus Lost was also on Booklist's Top 30 novels of the year in 2008, along with novels by Booker Prize winner Anne Enright, National Book Award winner Denis Johnson, Philip Roth, Don DeLillo, Michael Ondaatje, Ian MacEwan, Ha Jin, and Michael Chabon.
The novel also made the list of Best 25 Books of the Year of Library Journal, and Hospital was invited to be a keynote speaker at the annual convention of the American Library Association in Los Angeles in June 2008.
The Italian edition, Orfeo Perduto, has been so well-received in Italy that it will be a featured title at the literary festival on Lake Maggiore in June 2010 where Hospital will be a featured author.
She holds an endowed chair as Carolina Distinguished Professor of English at the University of South Carolina and in 2003 received the Russell Research Award for Humanities and Social Sciences, conferred by the university for the most significant faculty contribution (research, publication, teaching and service) in a given year.
Her first published short story appeared in the Atlantic Monthly (USA) where it won an 'Atlantic First' citation in 1978. Her first novel, The Ivory Swing (set in the village in South India where she lived in l977) won Canada's $50,000 Seal Award in l982. She lived for many years in Canada and in 1986 she was listed as by the Toronto Globe & Mail as one of Canada's 'Ten Best Young Fiction Writers'. Since then she has won a number of prizes for her eight novels and four short story collections and her work has been published in multiple foreign language collections. Three of her short stories appeared in Britain's annual Best Short Stories in English in their year of publication and one of these, 'Unperformed Experiments Have No Results', was selected for The Best of the Best, an anthology of the decade in l995.
The Last Magician, her fifth novel, was listed by Publishers' Weekly as one of the 12 best novels published in 1992 in the USA and was a New York Times 'Notable Book of the Year'. Oyster, her sixth novel, was a finalist for Australia's Miles Franklin Prize Award and for Canada's Trillium Award, and in England it was listed in 'Best Books of the Year' by The Observer, which noted "Oyster is a tour de force… Turner Hospital is one of the best female novelists writing in English." In the USA, Oyster was a New York Times 'Notable Book of the Year'.
Due Preparations for the Plague won the Queensland Premier's Literary Award in 2003, the Davitt Award from Sisters in Crime for "best crime novel of the year by an Australian woman”, and was shortlisted for the Christina Stead Award. In 2003, Hospital received the Patrick White Award, as well as a Doctor of Letters honoris causa from the University of Queensland.
Orpheus Lost, her most recent novel, was one of five finalists for the $110,000 Australia-Asia Literary prize in 2008.
Orpheus Lost was also on Booklist's Top 30 novels of the year in 2008, along with novels by Booker Prize winner Anne Enright, National Book Award winner Denis Johnson, Philip Roth, Don DeLillo, Michael Ondaatje, Ian MacEwan, Ha Jin, and Michael Chabon.
The novel also made the list of Best 25 Books of the Year of Library Journal, and Hospital was invited to be a keynote speaker at the annual convention of the American Library Association in Los Angeles in June 2008.
The Italian edition, Orfeo Perduto, has been so well-received in Italy that it will be a featured title at the literary festival on Lake Maggiore in June 2010 where Hospital will be a featured author.
She holds an endowed chair as Carolina Distinguished Professor of English at the University of South Carolina and in 2003 received the Russell Research Award for Humanities and Social Sciences, conferred by the university for the most significant faculty contribution (research, publication, teaching and service) in a given year.
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Displaying 1 - 9 of 9 reviews
July 16, 2018
Maybe I’m bringing my own bias into this read, but I can’t not feel JTH’s self important condescension jumping off of every page. I did not finish this book. I’m not all that interested in 70 more pages of a haughty white woman trying to write in the voice of POC and expats.
June 23, 2015
A delightful collection of short stories by a writer I have met, but hadn't read until now. I particularly liked those stories that brought in elements of immigrant experience. She has a wealth of diversity in her own background, which allows her to come from many angles. Most of the stories are more like character sketches, built around some interesting or unusual (and often quite usual) activities or life experiences. Some are hard, as perhaps that of a women suffering from serious burns. I liked the story of the English teacher working in a jail. Or the one about forbidden love among Indian immigrants in Canada.
May 17, 2020
I really liked this collection of stories. I don't typically read short stories, but during this time of limited library access I've been reading books that have been on my bookshelf for years. I had probably picked this up back in the 80's after reading two of Janet Turner Hospital's early novels (Tiger in the Tiger Pit and The Ivory Swing), both of which I loved. It was wonderful to read her again. I think her style is gorgeous.
February 15, 2023
What an interesting life Janette Turner Hospital has led. These seventeen stories show her insights into the major and minor differences between the Western (Australian and Canadian) and Eastern (Indian) worlds. She has an eye for the unique, the beautiful, no matter how small it seems amidst the press of people. These short stories show a lot of insight, and their diversity is stunning. Most of these tales have been previously published, all over the world.
August 24, 2023
A wonderful collection of short stories which, most unsurprisingly won the Fellowship of Australian Writers' Fiction Award. Each story is a small gem, entirely different from its neighbours. Some comic, some sad and written with an arch eye to the surprising phrase, the perfect word.
February 23, 2025
It took me months to finish this book. These are stories about people trying to make sense of the world (the stories are placed in locales that span the earth) and their place in it. In "The Bloody Past, the Wandering Future" one of the characters states, "Whichever world she's in, she always misses the other one and wants to go back" and this seems to be the theme of this book - the characters want to be somewhere else or some*time* else or they believe themselves to be someone else. Several of the characters are dark, strange loners and other stories didn't make a connection (I read the story and remained untouched) - I think these are the stories that lost me as a reader. There are many stories about death, broken families and outsiders, people at the margins of society either culturally/racially or because they are a little strange. Hospital has lived all over the world and her stories reflect this - they are diverse but they characters always exist as outsiders, country-less. My favorite stories were "The Inside Story" and "The Owl Bander".
July 8, 2008
Liked this. Short stories, each well crafted and quietly controvertial (not unlike myself!) I probably identified with each piece a *BIT* more than I should.....
April 29, 2012
A great collection of short stories. Many centre on death and loss.
February 7, 2019
A couple of very good stories but most were just average. 2.5*
Displaying 1 - 9 of 9 reviews