Owls Do Cry

Book excerpt: 'Owls Do Cry remains innovative and relevant' GUARDIAN 'Janet Frame was a unique and troubled soul whose luminous words are the more precious' HILARY MANTEL 'Her dark, eloquent song captured my heart ' JANE CAMPION Owls Do Cry is the story of the Withers family: Francie, soon to leave school to start work at the woollen mills; Toby, whose days are marred by the velvet cloak of epilepsy; Chicks, the baby of the family; and Daphne, whose rich, poetic imagination condemns her to a life in institutions. It is one of the classics of New Zealand literature and has remained in print continuously for fifty years. A fiftieth anniversary edition was published in 2007. Owls Do Cry is Janet Frame's first novel. She describes her idea behind it in the second volume of her autobiography: 'Pictures of great treasure in the midst of sadness and waste haunted me and I began to think, in fiction, of a childhood, home life, hospital life, using people known to me as a base for main characters, and inventing minor characters' Regarded by many as one of the best New Zealand novels published, Owls Do Cry forms a loose trilogy with her two subsequent novels, Faces in the Water and The Edge of the Alphabet.