Betty Lambert
Betty Lambert was a notable Canadian playwright, radio dramatist, and educator born on August 23, 1933, in Calgary, Alberta. Growing up on a farm and later earning a degree in philosophy and literature from the University of British Columbia, she became a single parent after her divorce. Lambert joined the faculty at Simon Fraser University in 1965, where she taught drama and creative writing until her passing in 1983.
Her writing career began with radio dramas for the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation, where she produced over fifty scripts that often tackled complex emotional issues, particularly focusing on women's experiences in oppressive relationships. Among her most recognized works is "Grasshopper Hill," which addresses the Holocaust's legacy through the lens of a troubled romance. Lambert's stage successes include the comedic "Sqriuex-de-Diue" and the poignant "Jennie's Story," both featuring strong female protagonists navigating restrictive societal norms.
Her only novel, "Crossings," explores themes of identity and marital conflict, while her final play, "Under the Skin," is a psychological thriller that underscores her ability to blend drama with suspense. Lambert's body of work has solidified her reputation as a significant voice in contemporary Canadian theater, particularly regarding women's issues and identity.
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Betty Lambert
Playwright
- Born: August 23, 1933
- Birthplace: Calgary, Alberta, Canada
- Died: November 4, 1983
Biography
Betty Lambert was born in Calgary, Alberta, on August 23, 1933, and grew up on a farm near the American border. Soon after completing her B.A. in philosophy and literature from the University of British Columbia,Vancouver, in 1957, she married Frank Lambert and had a daughter. She divorced after ten years and raised her daughter as a single parent. Lambert joined the faculty of the English department at the newly opened Simon Fraser University in 1965, and remained there, teaching drama and creative writing until her death in 1983.
While in college, Lambert worked as a copyeditor for a Vancouver radio station and there began writing radio dramas, a career interest that eventually led her to write more than fifty radio scripts that were performed for the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation. Unlike the radio dramas at the time, which were largely formulaic melodramas, Lambert’s scripts explored difficult issues, most often tempestuous relationships involving sensitive and intelligent women caught within tyrannical relationships; in addition, her scripts used rich, suggestive symbols to enhance the dramatic experience. For instance, Grasshopper Hill (1979), which won the Alliance of Canadian Cinema, Television, and Radio Artists Award for Best Radio Drama, dealt with the legacy of the Holocaust by examining the complex relationship between a professor and her lover, a survivor of the death camps. Lambert often tested how female characters define a sense of self only through painful relationships with men clearly not their intellectual or spiritual equal.
Lambert’s stage career began in 1966 with regional children’s theater. Her greatest success on the stage came relatively late in her career with two plays: Sqriuex-de-Diue (1975), a sexual farce about a suburban woman frustrated in her marriage and the mistress in love with her husband; and the powerful drama Jennie’s Story (1981), based on a true story about a mildly retarded farm wife who commits suicide after she discovers her mother had, years earlier, arranged to have her sterilized without her consent after a local priest had seduced her, using a provincial law on the books from 1928 to 1973 legalizing sterilization of the “unfit.” Although one play is a witty comedy, the other a harrowing social realist tragedy, both plays feature strong women struggling for identity within a stifling culture, testing the implications of their enslavement, and hungering for emotional freedom.
Similarly, Lambert’s only novel, Crossings (1979), centers on a woman writer locked in a violent marriage with a logger whose animal nature nevertheless provides spiritual fulfillment. Under the Skin (1985), Lambert’s last drama, suggests the promise of a career cut short. The play is a taut, complicated psychological thriller about two women, one a distraught mother who realizes an amiable neighbor has in fact kidnapped her daughter, the other the longsuffering wife of the same neighbor who struggles against accepting what she knows is the truth about her husband. By the time of her death on November 4, 1983, Lambert had established herself among the foremost exponents of women’s issues in contemporary Canadian theater, creating powerful character studies, often drawn from history or current events, of complex women defining themselves morally, spiritually, sexually, and emotionally.