Gwethalyn Graham's two published novels, Swiss Sonata (1938) and Earth and High Heaven (1944), both won awards in Canada. But it is the spectacular critical and popular success of her second novel which established her as internationally known writer, and it is for this novel that she is best remembered.

Graham was one of the barbingers of a new spirit in Canadian literature; she belongs to that group of Canadian novelists, which includes such writers as Frederick Philip Grove, Hugh MacLennan, and Gabrielle Roy, who were the first to deal seriously and realistically with the problems of contemporary Canada. Central to her work is an abiding concern for the rights of the individual in society, and there are strong indications in her family background that the experience of her early childhood and adolescence shaped her vision as a writer to a considerable degree.

Graham was born Gwethalyn Graham Erichsen-Brown in...