Margaret Atwood’s Old Babes in the Wood, “Impatient Griselda” #MARM2024

“Impatient Griselda” is just seven pages long and there are a couple of full readings on YouTube (about a dozen minutes).

If you want to hear it in Atwood’s own voice, she reads it as part of this performance presented by Theater of War Productions and Toronto International Festival of Authors. Three actors read the original source text from the Decameron, “Patient Griselda”, and then she reads her story. (The readings are about thirty minutes: panelists’ comments and audience questions span more than an hour of the two.)

Even though I haven’t read Old Babes in the Wood before, I recognised this was one of two stories I had read previously, as soon as I sat down and opened to the page. With only the opening sentence, I remembered.

It’s that kind of piece—so rooted in voice and concept that even a brief glimpse brings it all back. There’s a lot of humour, which is what I recalled, but you can also take the story very seriously: consider this abstract from a July 2024 journal.)

But what I’m thinking about right now is that jolt of recognition, the sense that this story is familiar. (I planned to write about the story, but they’ve said everything in the video! heheh)

It brings to mind a similar moment of recognition, with my reading of a book that Margaret Atwood edited with Douglas Preston, Fourteen Days (2024).

This book got tonnes of press, so you probably know the premise, that thirty-six authors contributed a segment to the novel, which was stitched together and framed with the overarching idea of strangers gathering to share stories during the Covid lockdowns, their storytelling creating a sense of community that countered loneliness and isolation.

Aside: All proceeds went to the Authors Guild Foundation, which represented the interests of (and, also, outright assisted) artists whose income was dramatically impacted by the pandemic. The literary agency also donated its commission; Suzanne Collins funded honorariums to the contributors. And the guild remains important, as it also supports projects that defend against school and library book bans, supports litigation that challenges those bans, and represents these concerns in American education and government (by appearing before Congress, for instance).

MARM 2024 PLANS

Launch (November 1)
Dancing Girls, “Training” (November 5)
Old Babes in the Wood, “My Evil Mother” (November 7)
Week Two: Update and Check-In (November 10)
Dancing Girls, “Lives of the Poets” (November 12)
Old Babes in the Wood, “The Dead Interview” (November 14)
Week Three: Update and Check-In (November 16)
Margaret Atwood’s 85^th Birthday (November 18)
Dancing Girls, “Dancing Girls” (November 19)
Old Babes in the Wood, “Impatient Griselda” (November 21)
Week Four: Update and Check-In (November 24)
Dancing Girls, “Giving Birth” (November 26)
Old Babes in the Wood, “Bad Teeth” (November 28)
Wrap-Up (November 30)

But back to Fourteen Days. The idea is that readers can enjoy the work of thirty-six different authors, but part of the fun is that, while you’re reading, you don’t know either who they are, or whose section is whose. Not until you get to the end of the book is there an alphabetical list, with authors’ names in bold type, their contributions in parentheses, with brief bio’s.

It works because the premise is that there’s a new superintendent in the apartment building, and when she comes onto the scene, she discovers the previous super’s detailed notes about the other tenants and their peculiarities. So, while she’s adjusting to her new job (and trying not to over-worry about her father, as he’s in an institution somewhere, out of contact), she’s sorting out who lives where, who’s friendly with whom (and unfriendly), and then mapping the experience of the pandemic on all those cool and fraught and tenuous and—above all—temporary relationships.

I read it over a long period of time. It felt very episodic, and I found that satisfying as a slow burn. When you read other readers’ objections to this project, it’s often the nature of the structure that was disappointing (it was the highlight for me, I love varied voices) but there is also another aspect of the story that was annoying to some readers (that very thing has annoyed me in other stories, too, but it worked for me here—partly, I think, because I read it over many weeks).

Early on, I thought it might be the kind of book I’d be happy to read once and then share with another curious reader but, in the end, I enjoyed it enough to think I might reread it after some time had passed.

But the point I intended to make? The only section of the entire book that I recognised was Margaret Atwood’s. And that’s partly because hers is a voice-driven segment, not unlike “Impatient Griselda” and the oozy nurse. But of course, I knew she was one of the contributors (based on her editorial role), and that was quite a hint.

Have you read either “Patient Griselda” or “Impatient Griselda”? Or, Fourteen Days? If you have, did you recognise any of the contributors without flipping to the back of the book? Have you read any other collaborative novels?