Jane Rule

Born in Plainfield, New Jersey, in 1931, Jane Vance Rule received her B.A. from Mills College, California, and taught for two years at Concord Academy, Massachusetts, where she met Helen Sonthoff with whom she lived from 1956 until Helen's death in 2000. After twenty years of working periodically at the University of British Columbia, she moved to Galiano Island, where she became a much-loved and generous contributor to the island community. She died at her Galiano home in November, 2007. Jane...See more

Born in Plainfield, New Jersey, in 1931, Jane Vance Rule received her B.A. from Mills College, California, and taught for two years at Concord Academy, Massachusetts, where she met Helen Sonthoff with whom she lived from 1956 until Helen's death in 2000. After twenty years of working periodically at the University of British Columbia, she moved to Galiano Island, where she became a much-loved and generous contributor to the island community. She died at her Galiano home in November, 2007. Jane Rule's seven novels present a range of characters in a variety of situations but it is for her unapologetic and clear-eyed writing on lesbian themes that she is best known. Her first published novel Desert of the Heart became a classic of lesbian literature; it was made into the film Desert Hearts. Her commissioned book Lesbian Images is a pioneering study of the often veiled forms in which women have written of love between women. She was also a prolific writer of short stories and essays, published in four previous collections. For ten years she wrote a column headed "So's your Grandmother" for the gay liberationist newspaper The Body Politic. The recipient of numerous awards in recognition of her work as writer and social activist, Jane Rule was inducted into the Order of British Columbia in 1998 and the Order of Canada in 2007. See less