Patricia Blondal

Patricia Blondal, née Jenkins (December 12, 1926 - November 4, 1959) was a Canadian writer, best known for her novel A Candle to Light the Sun.^[1]

Biography

Born in Souris, Manitoba,^[2] she grew up primarily in Winnipeg.^[2] She studied literature at the University of Manitoba, where she was a classmate of both Margaret Laurence and Adele Wiseman.^[2] During this time she wrote both fiction and poetry, including an unfinished novel titled Brass Tower, but later destroyed much of her early writing.^[2]

She married Harold Blondal, a physician, in 1946.^[2] The couple had two children;^[2] Patricia worked as a journalist and in public relations before devoting herself to getting published as a creative writer in 1955.^[2] Soon afterward, however, she was diagnosed with breast cancer, and died in 1959 just one month after A Candle to Light the Sun was accepted for publication by McClelland & Stewart;^[2] the novel was published posthumously in 1960, and was later reissued by the New Canadian Library series in 1976.

Blondal's only other published novel, From Heaven with a Shout, was serialized in Chatelaine before being published in book form in 1963.^[2]

Most of Blondal's poetry was never published; however, one previously unpublished poem about her breast cancer treatment was released by her daughter Stephanie to the literary magazine Winnipeg Connection in 2006.^[2]

Blondal's personal records are held by the University of British Columbia Library.^[3]

References