WRITER

Margaret Atwood

1939 - Today

Photo of Margaret Atwood

Icon of person Margaret Atwood

Margaret Eleanor Atwood (born November 18, 1939) is a Canadian poet, novelist, literary critic, essayist, teacher, environmental activist, and inventor. Since 1961, she has published 18 books of poetry, 18 novels, 11 books of nonfiction, nine collections of short fiction, eight children's books, two graphic novels, and a number of small press editions of both poetry and fiction. Atwood has won numerous awards and honors for her writing, including two Booker Prizes, the Arthur C. Clarke Award, the Governor General's Award, the Franz Kafka Prize, Princess of Asturias Awards, and the National Book Critics and PEN Center USA Lifetime Achievement Awards. Read more on Wikipedia

Since 2007, the English Wikipedia page of Margaret Atwood has received more than 9,143,683 page views. Her biography is available in 75 different languages on Wikipedia (up from 69 in 2019). Margaret Atwood is the 467th most popular writer (down from 366th in 2019), the 15th most popular biography from Canada (up from 17th in 2019) and the 3rd most popular Canadian Writer.

Margaret Atwood is most famous for her dystopian novel, The Handmaid's Tale.

Memorability Metrics

  • 9.1M

    Page Views (PV)

  • 67.42

    Historical Popularity Index (HPI)

  • 75

    Languages Editions (L)

  • 5.60

    Effective Languages (L*)

  • 5.35

    Coefficient of Variation (CV)

Notable Works

The blind assassin
Cat's eye
Alias Grace
The robber bride
The edible woman
Handmaid's Tale
A gripping vision of our society radically overturned by a theocratic revolution, Margaret Atwood's The Handmaid's Tale has become one of the most powerful and most widely read novels of our time. Offred is a Handmaid in the Republic of Gilead, serving in the household of the enigmatic Commander and his bitter wife. She may go out once a day to markets whose signs are now pictures because women are not allowed to read. She must pray for the Commander to make her pregnant, for in a time of declining birthrates her value lies in her fertility, and failure means exile to the dangerously polluted Colonies. Offred can remember a time when she lived with her husband and daughter and had a job, before she lost even her own name. Now she navigates the intimate secrets of those who control her every move, risking her life in breaking the rules.

Page views of Margaret Atwoods by language

Over the past year Margaret Atwood has had the most page views in the with 734,990 views, followed by French (60,682), and Spanish (60,258). In terms of yearly growth of page views the top 3 wikpedia editions are Manx (422.62%), Slovak (81.39%), and Simple English (49.98%)

Among WRITERS

Among writers, Margaret Atwood ranks 467 out of 7,302Before her are Léopold Sédar Senghor, Tibullus, Marguerite de Navarre, Saint-John Perse, John Galsworthy, and Eyvind Johnson. After her are Traudl Junge, Jules Michelet, Athenaeus, Louise de La Vallière, Joris-Karl Huysmans, and Livius Andronicus.

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Contemporaries

Among people born in 1939, Margaret Atwood ranks 20Before her are Harvey Keitel, Ada Yonath, Romano Prodi, Zviad Gamsakhurdia, Valeriy Lobanovskyi, and Karel Gott. After her are Ralph Lauren, Peter Grünberg, George Lazenby, Sonny Chiba, Laurent-Désiré Kabila, and Jackie Stewart.

Others Born in 1939

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In Canada

Among people born in Canada, Margaret Atwood ranks 15 out of 1,622Before her are Frank Gehry (1929), Erving Goffman (1922), Lucy Maud Montgomery (1874), Alice Munro (1931), Christopher Plummer (1929), and Marshall McLuhan (1911). After her are David Cronenberg (1943), James Naismith (1861), Glenn Gould (1932), Eric Berne (1910), Willard Boyle (1924), and Frederick Banting (1891).

Among WRITERS In Canada

Among writers born in Canada, Margaret Atwood ranks 3Before her are Lucy Maud Montgomery (1874), and Alice Munro (1931). After her are Saul Bellow (1915), Brian Tracy (1944), A. E. van Vogt (1912), David Morrell (1943), Anne Carson (1950), Shulamith Firestone (1945), Gabrielle Roy (1909), Mazo de la Roche (1879), and Louise Penny (1958).