Alice Munro, the Canadian writer renowned for her contributions to the contemporary short story, has died at age 92. Munro died at her Ontario home on May 13, her family confirmed to the Globe and Mail. She won many esteemed literary awards, including the Nobel Prize in Literature in 2013 and the Man Booker International Prize for her lifetime body of work in 2009. Three of her short-story collections — 1968’s Dance of the Happy Shades, 1978’s Who Do You Think You Are?, and 1986’s The Progress of Love — were awarded the Governor General’s Literary Award for fiction, a prestigious Canadian accolade. Her writing was known for capturing the complex lives of everyday women and men and innovating upon the short-story structure by manipulating time in unexpected ways.
Munro was born Alice Ann Laidlaw in 1931 in southwestern Ontario, where many of her stories are set. She studied English and journalism at the University of Western Ontario for two years, then married fellow student James Munro. The couple, who remained together from 1951 to 1972, opened Munro’s Books, a bookstore that is still in operation. She published her first short-story collection, Dance of the Happy Shades, at age 37 in 1968. Over the course of her career, Munro wrote over 160 stories that were published in collections or compilations. Her sole novel, The Lives of Girls and Women, has been described by some as a short-story cycle. Munro’s writing has inspired several film adaptations, including Pedro Almodóvar’s 2016 film Julieta, which draws from her 2004 collection Runaway. Other movies based on her work include Edge of Madness, Away From Her, and Hateship, Loveship.
Dear Life, published in 2012, was Munro’s last story collection. Prior to receiving the Nobel Prize in 2013, she had already announced her intent to retire. After learning of her win, Munro spoke with the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation about the potential implications of the news. “I would really hope this would make people see the short story as an important art,” she reportedly said, “not just something you played around with until you got a novel.”