Emma Donoghue

Irish-Canadian writer

Born: October 24, 1969

Famous Persons

Who is Emma Donoghue?

Emma Donoghue (born October 1969) is an Irish Canadian novelist, screenwriter, playwright and literary historian. Donoghue was born in Dublin, Ireland, in 1969. The youngest of eight children, she is the daughter of Frances (née Rutledge) and academic and literary critic Denis Donoghue. She has a first-class honours Bachelor of Arts degree from University College Dublin (in English and French) and a PhD in English from Girton College, Cambridge. Her 2010 novel Room was a finalist for the Booker Prize and an international best-seller. She is a 2011 recipient of the Alex Awards. Room was adapted by Donoghue into a film of the same name. While at Cambridge she lived in a women's co-operative, an experience which inspired her short story "The Welcome".

Donoghue reading at the Eden Mills Writers' Festival in 2017

Historical significance

Donoghue's 1995 novel Hood won the Stonewall Book Award and Slammerkin (2000) won the Ferro-Grumley Award for Lesbian Fiction. For this, she was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Adapted Screenplay. In 2025, Donoghue won the Alice B Readers Award given annually to living writers of published works whose careers are distinguished by consistently well-written works about lesbians.

Sources and further reading

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Wikipedia source

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MLA

“Emma Donoghue.” thisDay, thisday.info/people/emma-donoghue/. Accessed 24 Oct. 2026.

APA

Emma Donoghue. (n.d.). thisDay. Retrieved October 24, 2026, from https://thisday.info/people/emma-donoghue/

Chicago

“Emma Donoghue.” thisDay. Accessed October 24, 2026. https://thisday.info/people/emma-donoghue/.

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