Literature
Judith Guest
born 1936 · novelist, screenwriter
Detroit-born author of Ordinary People, the basis of the Oscar-winning 1980 film, and great-niece of Free Press poet Edgar Guest.
- Born
Detroit, Michigan
age 90- Birth name
- Judith Ann Guest
- Detroit years
- 1936–1954
- Field
- Literature
01 / The Detroit story
The Detroit story
Guest was born in Detroit and is the great-niece of the city's beloved newspaper poet Edgar Guest. She attended Mumford High School on the northwest side until her family moved to suburban Royal Oak, where she graduated from Royal Oak High School in 1954, before studying English and psychology at the University of Michigan. She worked as a teacher and raised a family before her first novel, Ordinary People (1976), a quiet study of a suburban family broken by grief, became a surprise bestseller. Robert Redford's 1980 film version won four Oscars, including Best Picture. Her later books include Second Heaven, set in suburban Detroit, and The Tarnished Eye (2004), loosely based on an unsolved Michigan murder case.
Highlights
- Ordinary People (1976): Janet Heidinger Kafka Prize; filmed by Robert Redford (Best Picture, 1980)
- Second Heaven (1982), set in the Detroit suburbs
- The Tarnished Eye (2004), inspired by an unsolved Michigan crime
- Great-niece of poet Edgar Guest
02 / Their Detroit places
Their Detroit places 1
Where they lived, worked, performed and liked to hang out. Closed and demolished places stay here too, because they are part of the city's history.
Studied here · 1951
Mumford High School
The northwest-side Detroit high school she attended before her family moved to Royal Oak.