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“A writer, in some ways, lives and dies with the characters”: An Interview with Madeleine Thien
Says Madeleine Thien, author of the award-winning novel, Do No Say We Have Nothing. I often judge a book by its cover. But when it came to Scotiabank Giller Prize winner Madeleine Thien’s Do Not Say We Have Nothing (the book also received the Governor General’s Literary Award and was shortlisted for the Man Booker Prize), history was not bound to repeat itself. I met Thien during a session organized by Pivot Reading Series late November. As I mustered up the courage to speak to the author, I was soon pleasantly surprised by her honesty and genuine interest. When asked how the people closest to her shaped her into the…
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Of Pirates, Parrots, and Persecution: An Interview with Gary Barwin
Ever heard of a talking parrot? I am assuming you have. Now what about the 500-year-old immortal, gay, and Yiddish-speaking parrot, who has set the literary world abuzz? Oh! Did we mention the parrot is also the narrator of a tale brimming with pirates, Italian explorer Christopher Columbus, and the tragic Spanish inquisition from the 12th and 19th centuries? If that just made your head spin, let us direct you to the source—Gary Barwin, a writer, composer, multimedia artist, and the author of twenty books of poetry, fiction, and books. In his first adult fiction, Yiddish for Pirates, the 52-year-old pulled out all the stops in creating a literary piece…
