Australian · 1902–1983
Christina Stead's "The Man Who Loved Children" sold poorly on publication in 1940, then became a cult classic decades later when Randall Jarrell championed it. The Australian novelist created a portrait of family dysfunction so intense it borders on suffocation. Stead spent most of her life in Europe and America, writing novels of psychological extremity set in multiple countries. Her work was rediscovered by feminists who recognized in her fiction an unflinching account of domestic power.