The intention of this paper is to examine Janet Frame's two worlds, the people who inhabit them and the forces that have created them. This in turn will involve a discussion of the Life/Death, False/Real, Seeing/Blind, Sane/Insane, Treasure/Rubbish dichotomies that occur in all her works.

"This" world, the one inhabited by most of us, is one where "no one must be out of tune" …, a place where man has been robbed of his individuality and reduced to nothing more than an "empty blackened little column of cardboard" …, a puppet to be manipulated as the paper dolls are made to dance by the old lady in The Edge of the Alphabet….

In "this" world individuality is an affliction rather than a blessing, for "life" necessitates suppression of all that falls outside the accepted pattern; conform or be annihilated…. It is this destruction of the...