Janet Frame: Fiction, Reality, and the In-between

Abstract

This article attempts to unveil some of the mysteries and controversies surrounding the public image of Janet Frame. It looks closely at Frame’s posthumously published autobiographical novel Towards Another Summer and her autobiography, both of which portray a female writer as a protagonist, modelled on the author. It explores the relationships between the author and her fictional proxies in connection with Frame’s idea of personality and her understanding of truth and reality, as expressed in interviews, autobiography, and fiction. It is normally expected that nonfiction writing be aligned with real facts, characters, and life events, while the world of imagination is more likely to be associated with fiction. The article, however, demonstrates that in Frame’s case, the distinction between fiction and reality is impossible and unhelpful. The absence of clear boundaries between facts and imagination becomes a characteristic feature of both the author’s fiction and autobiography and is a deliberate technique that she uses to convey her ideas on the subjectivity of reality. Generating both interest and confusion, this feature of Frame’s writing feeds the aura of mysticism around her, adding to the development of her public image that may have very little to do with her private self.