It’s been a MARMvellous week indeed, with several in our cosy group already posting about their reading:
Bill has reached farthest back into MA’s chronology with Lady Oracle;
Rebecca has read The Penelopiad;
Kaggsy both Dearly and “Cut & Thirst”; and
Bron joined in with “Death by Clamshell”.
Beyond our cosy circle, the Handmaids made an appearance in Washington DC on November 5th. I love their Tshirts, with the quote about not making handmaids wear uniforms if they weren’t s’posed to become an army of resistance.
Also, in Australia’s The Age, Bill spotted Melanie Kembrey’s review of MA’s Book of Lives, which succinctly positions MA and GG in the context of CanLit: “Together they helped shape Canada’s literary landscape … championing a national literature when few believed one existed.”
And another surprise: the brand new Elbows Up! anthology (Penguin Random House, subtitled Canadian Voices of Resilience and Resistance, edited by Elamin Abdelmahmoud) opens with a piece by MA.
MARM 2025 PLANS
Launch (November 1)
Old Babes in the Wood, “Death by Clamshell” (November 4)
The Blind Assassin Parts I-IV (November 6)
Week Two: Update and Check-In (November 8)
Old Babes in the Wood, “Freeforall” (November 11)
The Blind Assassin Parts V-VI (November 13)
Week Three: Update and Check-In (November 15)
Margaret Atwood’s 86th Birthday (November 18)
Old Babes in the Wood, “Metepsychosis” (November 18)
The Blind Assassin Parts VII-IX (November 20)
Week Four: Update and Check-In (November 22)
Old Babes in the Wood, “Airborne: A Symposium” (November 25)
The Blind Assassin Parts X-XV (November 27)
Wrap-Up (November 30)
She writes about the similarities between the call now for resistance to #47’s declaration that Canada will be the 51st state, and the mid-80s call to secure national industries before prioritising the needs and profits of our southern neighbour—and the then-risk and now-reality of imbalances that ensued. [If Elbows Up! is a new concept for you, here’s a Canadian explanation, and an American one.]
Book of Lives was published on Tuesday; if you have a favourite review, share your link below. I particularly enjoyed this piece in The Walrus by Amarah Hasham-Steele, which explores the connections and intersections between a 1983 short story and the new memoir, as well as the assumptions readers make about how much of a writer’s fiction is rooted in truth.
“I first encountered Atwood’s 1983 short story “Significant Moments in the Life of My Mother” in an undergraduate literature seminar. In the story, a woman reflects on her relationship with her mother, and how it has been impacted by shifting expectations of femininity, domesticity, and caregiving in their respective generations. Discussing the story, I recall students putting up their hands and commenting on ‘Atwood’s relationship with her mother.’ ‘No,’ my professor would correct us. ‘Not Atwood. The narrator.’ The body double.”
This is actually where Atwood herself begins Book of Lives, with the sense of having a doppelganger. With the fractured view that takes hold, when one is perpetually writing stories in one’s mind even while living one’s own life—telling it and living it in such tight quarters that it becomes hard to tell where the telling and living overlap.
But I’ve not read far myself: have you? I’ve been preoccupied by The Blind Assassin, which started slowly for me. It’s going fine now, but I swear Chapter V is long enough to be its own book. And I’ve not even picked up Paper Boat yet, but I’ve been enjoying some novellas this week too. Heading into the second week, I’d like to read a few poems, and an article I tucked away last spring.
To everyone who’s been enjoying cake and flowers, thank you for coming to the party. If you’re still making plans, do share! (I wouldn’t want to miss anyone!)
Margaret Atwood
“You can’t stick a person in the woods and expect them to become a writer.”
November 6, 2025 CBC’s “The Current”
I would like to read the memoir, but who knows … however, I have read Bill’s post on Lady Oracle, and your link here to Rebecca’s Penelopiad took me there. I will soon read Brona’s short story one.
I will say that one day you perhaps should interrupt her day. I’ve done it twice – once to David Malouf who happened to be sitting in the foyer of the National Library (perhaps waiting for someone) and the other, Kate Grenville. Admittedly that was a poetry reading where she’d read, but it was afterwards when she was just sitting at the table (this was in a bar-cafe venue). In both cases, I just went over and said how much I appreciated their writing and named one book I particularly liked and then left them in peace. I’m not sure what David Malouf thought – he’s a quiet dignified man, and perhaps shy. But I got the distinct impression that it mean something to Kate Grenville. However, I guess it does depend on the circumstances, and Atwood can be fierce so I might have second thoughts if that opportunity ever arose. My point is, though, that I think many writers suffer from doubt and do like a personal affirmation from one of their readers?
Just started reading Book of Lives last night and was laughing myself silly over what she wrote about her hair because my hair is curly and I have for years harbored the aspiration for it to look like Atwood’s when I am her age! James also calls me Medusa. I thought briefly that perhaps I might send her a note on the matter, but then she probably gets so many notes and I don’t want to intrude.
I should know better, but I was so surprised by the humour! And I’m the same way (but with flat straight hair, so also the opposite LOL); I’ve encountered her a few times around the city over the years and I have never interrupted her day.
Thanks for this, Marcie – will catch up with those reviews. I’m a bit late to the party, and I didn’t even bring flowers – just a cat’s eye marble in a red plastic purse. But I’ll get chatting to people now, and I’m sure it’ll go fine 🙂
Hah! A guarantted conversation-starter with this crowd: have a seat and help yourself to the cake!
It will be interesting to read her comments about autofiction — I had that story plus various from Wilderness Tips in mind when I saw in her recent Guardian interview that she said she’s never ‘done’ autobiography before!
Maybe that’s where I read it too, I’ve lost track! We have a paid subscription to “The Guardian” now, thanks to their independence and their series on verification in the media (AI, images, etc.) so it quite likely was.
Every little titbit coming from Atwood’s memoir is only enticing me more! I may not be able to wait for the paperback!
I jumped more quickly than I would have because of MARM, but now I’m glad. Big books like this often get passed along due to space constraints, but I haven’t even read 50 pages yet, and I’ve announced (to the air) that I’m keeping this one. Do you have a library nearby? I mean, for obvious reasons, you would think of a bookstore first, but does that mean no library use at all?
Although I said ‘review’ when I sent you the quote, it was actually an interview. I know you have said Atwood is respectful of her predecessors but I get the impression that she doesn’t dislike the idea that before her there was nothing. It’s an interesting power to hold. Certainly no one believes that of any Australian author. Although we are a much younger (white) nation than you, we have always had a literature.
It gets back to something else we discussed a week or so ago. And that is if the universities don’t rate your literature (or don’t rate women) then they are held not to exist.
Thanks for setting the record straight. It probably doesn’t sit well with your tendency towards absolutism, but I believe both can be true, that she can value the literary ancestors (the Moodie poems, for instance) but still recognise her own role in bringing CanLit onto the global lit stage (award nominations). Michael Ondaatje holds the same position here, not Atwood alone, but his public reticence makes it easier to overlook his role.
I’ve been thinking a lot (largely due to Talaga’s The Knowing) about how differnt the colonial process was between A and C, perhaps because of the fur trade here and the sense of independence/isolation that seems to characterise Australia from first contact. Maybe the heightened colonial presence/absence is behind the sense of second-best and slow-start for writers/artistry here? Musing.
I’m hoping Atwood’s memoir will make it into the Ramblings by the end of the year, but if it doesn’t I’ll be scouring the sales!!!
I think you mentioned you have a signed copy of Dearly? Hopefully you can find one for the memoir too (I’m guessing they’re around).
I’m not always interested in literary memoirs, but Atwood’s is a must-read! She’s always so thought-provoking and entertaining in interviews, I’m looking forward to it.
I wasn’t sure if that would be so evident in a memoir (I was thinking of the biographies I’ve read, I guess) but it is: it feels like she’s speaking to you directly.