Jeanette Winterson: The Essential Guide

Vintage living texts

by Margaret Reynolds, Jonathan Noakes

In "Vintage Living Texts", teachers and students will find the essential guide to the works of Jeanette Winterson. It is unique in that it offers an in-depth interview with Jeanette Winterson, relating specifically to the texts under discussion. This guide deals with Winterson's themes, genre and narrative technique, and a close reading of the texts will provide a rich source of ideas for intelligent and inventive ways of approaching the novels.

204 pages, Paperback

First published February 1, 2003

About the author

Librarian Note: There is more than one author by this name in the Goodreads data base.

Margaret Reynolds is Professor of English and Modern Culture whose work explores nineteenth to twenty-first century literature, poetry, and the transmission of classical texts. Educated at Oxford and London, her edition of Elizabeth Barrett Browning’s Aurora Leigh won the British Academy’s Rose Mary Crawshay Prize. She co-edited Victorian Women Poets, authored The Sappho Companion, The Sappho History, and edited Adam Bede for Penguin. A writer and broadcaster for the BBC, The Guardian, and The Times, she also published the memoir The Wild Track in 2021.

Reviews

[Shane · Rating 2 out of 5]

While the author interview that precedes the reading guides is fine, the guides themselves – for three Jeanette Winterson classics + The Powerbook (not one of her best) – are presumably meant to anticipate exam questions. A serious student would get more from in-depth reviews (of the kind of which a few are excerpted at the end), comparing, and conceiving their own questions. A guide to Written on the Body or even Gut Symmetries – each more unique in Winterson’s oeuvre than The Powerbook – might have been more interesting.

[Edward Amato · Rating 4 out of 5]

I have really enjoyed reading Jeanette Winterson's books. Having leafed through this I plan on rereading them and utilizing this excellent guide.