Hi, my name is Jane and I’m a wordaholic.
I knew I would be in trouble last Sunday at Toronto’s The Word on the Street, a festival promoting all things literary for all ages. Good thing I took an empty knapsack for some purchases! It was great to wander the exhibits and pick up some bestsellers, back issues of magazines I don’t subscribe to and single issues of indie publications that are difficult to find in the burbs.
Margaret Atwood
The highlight of my afternoon was to hear Margaret Atwood read a passage from her new book, The Year of the Flood. Such a bright lady, with a sarcastic wit and simultaneous twinkle in her eye. I think she knows full well what she’s getting away with in terms of social commentary and I love it. Apologies for the grainy photo: there was no way to avoid that tent pole between Margaret Atwood, John Cruickshank (Publisher of The Toronto Star) and Eleanor Wachtel (host of Writers & Company on CBC Radio). After she read a passage, there was a Q & A session live with audiences in both Vancouver and Halifax: we could see them on large screens and they could presumably gawk back at us in Toronto.
Atwood said that The Year of the Flood is neither a prequel or sequel to Oryx and Crake, but that it is a “simultanial”. It is set in the same world, it ends on the same day only 12 hours later, and tells a new story from a different point of view. Fabulous! I really enjoyed Oryx and Crake and look forward to savouring her speculative post-apocalyptic future in this new book.
I find it hard to believe that people will still ask her what she thinks the future holds, as if they think she has some magic crystal ball the rest of us are not privy to. She answers this question the same way everytime – she does not predict the future, there are too many variables. So why don’t people accept that she is writing speculative fiction and think that her imagination is some kind of prognostication? Perhaps because she weaves in enough currency in terms of trends taken to extreme that the reader wonders if some of it could come true if trends run amok. Whether they will or not is anyone’s guess, including Atwood’s.
Two years ago, my daughter completed an independent study project for high school English where she chose to write an alternate ending for Oryx and Crake, a monologue for Jimmy. She presented it as a drama skit to the class and the teacher was speechless. Later, she sent her assignment to Margaret Atwood who very kindly replied with a personal letter saying “You write very well” and encouraged her to keep writing. This praise was wonderful and my daughter is indeed still writing, almost everyday: at last count she was working on her eleventh book of speculative fiction. The fridge magnets hold a special place of honour on her mini-fridge at university, “I think, therefore I spam.”
On a final note, this award-winning author has interesting taste in footwear. She was sporting a conservative black pant suit with a book tour t-shirt, accented by a bright red pair of MBT Anti-Shoes. I like her style: she’s true to her own choices.
