BACKGROUND INFORMATION - BIOGRAPHY

Author Information

Barbara Kingsolver grew up in eastern Kentucky and, like her character Marietta Greer, never imagined herself staying there. She left Kentucky and attended DePauw University in Indiana where she majored in biology. (She took one creative writing course.) She pursued graduate studies in biology and ecology at the University of Arizona in Tucson, receiving a Masters of Science degree. (She also took a writing class taught by author Francine Prose.)

After graduate school Kingsolver wrote for journals and newspapers as a science writer for the University of Arizona. In 1986 she won an Arizona Press Club award. In 1995 she was awarded an Honorary Doctorate of Letters from DePauw University after the publication of High Tide in Tucson: Essays from Now or Never.

The Bean Trees was published in 1988. It was received enthusiastically by critics and read with delight by ordinary readers. Kingsolver began this novel while pregnant and suffering insomnia, sitting in a closet. The novel won the Enoch Pratt Library Youth-to Youth Books Award, the American Library Association Notable Book and the New York Times Notable Book.

The Bean Trees was followed by a collection called Homeland and Other Stories (1989), a nonfiction work, Holding the Line: Women in the Great Arizona Mine Strike (1989), a poetry collection, Another America: Otra America (1992), and the novels, Animal Dreams (1990), Pigs in Heaven (1993), The Poisonwood Bible (1998), and her most recent work, Prodigal Summer (2000).

Barbara Kingsolver is both a writer and a human rights activist. Her writing is actually a form of political activism. In addition, she gardens, cooks, hikes, and plays hand drums and keyboards with her husband, guitarist, Steven Hopp. She lives with her husband and two daughters near Tucson and in Southern Appalachia.

HISTORICAL INFORMATION

There are two items of history that will assist in the understanding of the authorÂ’s development of the story. The first is the existence of the Cherokee Nation, the second, the Guatemalan Civil War.

The Cherokee Nation was established in 1839 after almost 17,000 Indians were forced from their southeastern homeland and marched to "Indian Territory", now the state of Oklahoma. About 4,000 died of hunger, exposure, and disease on this Trail of Tears. The Cherokee Nation is the second largest Indian tribe in the U.S. Many of its over 200,000 members live in a 7,000 square mile area in northeastern Oklahoma. They have their own democratic government and their own constitution. They do not have a President and Vice President, but a Principal Chief and Deputy Principal Chief. Their Congress is the Tribal Council.

The Guatemalan Civil War lasted over thirty years from 1960- 1996. The Bean Trees was written in 1988, before the Central American Relief Act. At that time, America was supporting the oppressive regime and Central American refugees were not legally allowed into the country. There have since been reports of genocide, murder and other human rights violations. The 1996 Peace Accord ended the Guatemalan Civil War but the countryÂ’s democracy is fragile.

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