Initially, I watched Hana Gartner interviewing Margaret Atwood on “Take 30” Sept. 27, 1977 as a complement to Dancing Girls, and ostensibly that’s the subject. But it’s more interesting as an example of the kind of preconceptions and judgements Atwood’s faced throughout her career.
You don’t learn about the book (MA’s eleventh); you learn how to respond to an interviewer making statements rather than asking questions, how to respond to someone’s anger about feeling SomeKindaWay.
“All the stories are based in this,” the host says: sadness. She sounds partly hurt, partly angry and describes feeling that the stories are filled with relationships like trains—with women on one track and men the other—nobody connecting. It doesn’t sounds like she’s inviting conversation, it sounds like she’s levelling accusations. How dare she tell these sad, sad stories.
Sad Stories
It appears they might agree, momentarily, that literature should provoke strong reactions in readers; but Gartner clarifies that it’s a strong sadness, and the finger-wagging is audible. (Later, Gartner complains there are many lonely people—in the stories—and Atwood says there are many lonely people—in the world—and the silence thrums.)
MA appears taken aback; she asks Gartner which stories and says at least one of them is funny, but Gartner says that’s only “gallows humour” which “ultimately turns out rotten”—in other words, she still feels sad. Is it the story or the feeling that’s “rotten”, MA asks aloud: the situation, Gartner responds, usually a situation between a man and a woman.
Does the Story Ordering Matter?
Despite the joke MA offers next, tension remains. She jokes again, about not remembering which stories are included and asks for Gartner’s copy. If I’d been on camera in this moment, you’d’ve seen my own eyes narrow with distrust.
Because it’s possible this is true; authors touring have often lost touch with that book, having passed it off to an editor a year or two prior to focus on other work. In this case, with stories previously published elsewhere, that’d add to any disorientation.
But it doesn’t feel like MA’s forgotten; she seems to seek a moment to look downward and gather herself. (Also, she’s too quick, with later discussion of a story, to identify it as the second one—Gartner is talking over her, but it’s audible.)
Gartner laughs loudly and queries after MA’s “quizzical” look because they are her own stories and MA explains the first story goes back to 1962 (“The War in the Bathroom”, which I wrote about last MARM)—“that was pretty sad” Gartner inserts—whereas the final four were written closer to 1977.
The Obligation to be Joyful (or, What She Should’ve Written)
The first story, MA says is a “down” story but the last an “up” story…and isn’t that preferable to an “up” towards “down” trajectory. It feels like she’s inviting a shared moment here, but Gartner says she’s not complaining about the ordering of the stories, she wants to point out how “dismal” they are. “I thought you left out a lot of joy” Gartner says—left out understanding and compromise.
Gartner doesn’t name a story but describes one (the second story, “The Man from Mars”) which doesn’t help. MA’s visibly surprised by Gartner’s description of how the woman in the story starts to enjoy being victimized by a man and how the woman and man never get to know each other. At one point MA’s eyes flit to the camera with disbelief, at another she seems to flinch. (It’s so uncomfortable, I pause and debate continuing.)
On Victimization and Survival
Later it seems like, in that moment, MA was debating whether/how to reroute the conversation. Because it feels like Gartner has invented elements and you wonder if she actually read the story. In my own reading (linked, above), it’s not about a male-female relationship as much as it’s about class and anti-immigration sentiment. It’s hard to see how Gartner has pulled out the male-female “situation”, because it’s not about a potential romance but generational and cultural conflict.
MARM 2023 PLANS
Each week I’ll share links to some online sources, so that anyone with a few minutes can join in the celebrations. Some poetry and flash fiction, some interviews and reviews, some fresh reads and rereads: mostly reading with a little viewing and, in particular, short stories.
Launch (November 1)
Dancing Girls, “Rape Fantasies” (November 3)
Dancing Girls, “Hair Jewellery” (November 10)
Old Babes in the Wood, “First Aid” (November 12)
Dancing Girls, “A Travel Piece” (November 17)
Margaret Atwood’s 84th Birthday (November 18)
Old Babes in the Wood, “Two Scorched Men” (November 19)
Dancing Girls, “The Resplendent Quetzel” (November 24)
Old Babes in the Wood, “Morte de Smudgie” (November 26)
Wrap-Up (November 29-30)
Thereafter, MA speaks more directly, at greater length, and she describes how it’s the man who’s victimized (both generally, treated as an alien, and specifically, as a pawn in this mother-daughter conflict).
But that’s not the story Gartner wants to discuss or the story she read (if she read it); she sees the woman as victimized.
“I don’t think that’s in the stories,” MA says. She tries to make a joke again, that perhaps Gartner has been reading some of MA’s other books. Gartner doesn’t laugh. MA offers a tangent to her book Survival, saying that it considers victimization in CanLit as a broader theme. Gartner ignores that invitation to shift the topic and asks if MA thinks she’s confused to which MA quickly replies no.
“You’re going to be a different person when you’re 80 than you are now,” MA says, in response to a series of questions that include whether she’d’ve come on the show to discuss her gardening and canoeing. (You wouldn’t have invited me for that? How do you know? Because, MA says, you never have.) But it’s hard to believe MA would respond differently at 80 to accusatory questions. She’s not telling anyone how to think—“If that’s the term you want to use, that’s fine,” she says at one point, tight-lipped and abrupt—she’s defining her own terms.
“Rape Fantasies” (First published in Fiddlehead and Toronto Life)
The funny thing is that a careful reading of this story—set in an office lunchroom (it feels like a cut-scene from The Edible Woman)—provides ample opportunity to discuss how characters grapple with overwhelming emotions, fears and sorrows, in response to an article in a women’s magazine.
Gartner’s question—about whether MA is a pessimist or optimist— could’ve included the narrator’s observation in “Rape Fantasies”: “My mother always said you shouldn’t dwell on unpleasant things and I generally agree with that, I mean, dwelling on them doesn’t make them go away. Though not dwelling on them doesn’t make them go away ether, when you come to think of it.”
They could’ve discussed what we can learn from reading and telling and sharing stories. How the women talk about their fantasies is varied and curious, informative about their personal experiences but also entertaining (and how the narrator’s jokes don’t elicit laughter as a response).
The funniest funny thing is this could be the story MA references in the interview, the humourous one—which seems incredible, and probably isn’t true (it’s probably that last, “up” story)—given how the narrator analyses her own “fantasies”, redefines the term, redresses power imbalances, and how she evades-bargains-attacks-complies…it all invites serious discussion about victimization, but it also makes me laugh out loud.
And there’s the ending: “…I think it would be better if you could get a conversation going. Like, how could a fellow do that to a person he’s just had a long conversation with, once you let them know you’re human, you have a life too, I don’t see how they could go ahead with it, right? I mean, I know it happens but I just don’t understand it, that’s the part I really don’t understand.”
But when you start the conversation with there only being two tracks—how do you get to having a conversation about the train?
“Leading the witness, your honour!” That’s the worst when an interviewer has their own agenda to get across and isn’t interested in having a genuine dialogue or discovering the nuances of the author’s opinions. I love author Q&As and generally get to do a couple per month these days. I try to be sensitive and not put too much of my own reading into interview questions for Foreword Reviews and Shelf Awareness.
It could still have be interesting if the interviewer had supported her experience of their being sad, dismal, rotten stories. I think you could find elements of the stories to represent these qualities and then there could have been an exchange that reminds us all that we each receive stories in the context of our own life experiences and understanding even if they ended up wholly disagreeing about specific characters or their decisions of their observations. It’s hard, I think, to be fully engaged with the work and inhabit it, yet, still, not overwrite or presuppose/assume; I struggle to find that balance too.
Oh dear – I will watch that interview but I’m not a fan of an interviewer fixing on their own reading and getting combative. I do enjoy Atwood interviews usually though, she’s so fiercely bright. Great post Marcie.
It reminds me of another interview I watched years ago (black-and-white, I believe) with her conducted by a male interviewer about her poetry or non-fiction, I believe; his paternalism felt palpable. It’s shocking to remember that it really wasn’t all that long ago that a woman being invited on a television program (as a guest, expert) to discuss anything at all was unusual.
The Hana Gartner interview felt like a window into Margaret’s fierce intellect. The tension between the two and the hostility coming from the interviewer was palpable – talk about trains on different tracks. It was uncomfortable to watch. I appreciated MA’s pointed explanation that what she writes is the work and what it’s about, and that people (those judging her work) mistake her characters for her. I wonder how many times she has had to say this over the years. I can understand her defensiveness but I also loved how she addressed the comments seriously and it seems the interviewer didn’t see that. Thanks for sharing this.
It took me an hour to watch this 20-minute video: maybe this is why I feel so short on time these days? Heheh But I kept pausing, reversing to see whether I was imagining something that wasn’t actually happening, wondering what I was bringing to it myself. I thought it was revealing that, when she asked Gartner whether it was the stories or the feeling that was rotten, a good conversation could have emerged…but it seemed like Gartner was responding from her gut, determined to not choose whatever options MA presented as a possible basis for someone reading the stories and feeling that sense of rotten-ness, a point from which interesting discussion could expand and extend, and then Gartner dismisses both and doesn’t offer anything concrete about her third option (situations) from which a discussion could emerge either.
The irony of the two not being able to connect when HG was talking about that very subject…but despite the fraught situation it was a reminder of how my own assumptions can get in the way of listening. Did you feel you were bringing something of your own into it?
I think that’s why I rewatched so many parts of it, peering to see if I was overwriting my own (related or unrelated) assumptions onto the interviewer, whether I was misinterpreting her the same way that she seemed to be misinterpreting the writer’s intent and the characters’ motivations.
Among other things, HG’s mention of the two tracks struck a nerve for me, given the political zeitgeist–the tendency (determination, even) to focus on points of disagreement rather agreement and to prioritise either/or over both/and thinking, shutting down communication–and various irreconcilable personal differences too.
That is interesting! It echoes current politics and methods of communication. Perhaps that is one reason the interview is painful to watch. But we have the work. It stands. It’s out there 🙂
Well, that interview was entertaining. And it makes me want to read the book! How sad is it really? Whose side will I fall on? Could it be any more dismal than Mavis Gallant?
Hahaha It does seem like a matter of sides, doesn’t it? It felt very combative to me. But, then, I don’t know how much of that is the supposedly-typical-Canadian aversion to conflict and confrontation?
Like how overly nice the Canadian judges are on Bake Off compared to the British judges (and by British judges, I really mean just Paul)? Thank you, BTW, for devastating countless reading hours for me, by getting me hooked on these baking shows.
Interesting question. I’d say Gallant has an unfair advantage (or disadvantage…is this a title she would want to claim, a desirable distinction? heheh) with her stories being wartime or post-war. Maybe there’s room for a take-off on Simon’s (of Stuck in a Book) lists of Unnecessary Rankings, for most dismal-est and most rotten-est and most-saddest Canadian stories/novels?
My what an interview. I saw a live Atwood interview in the late 80s I’d say (or mid 90s) and she was on her game. I thought to myself, she’s terrifying to interview, but she was great, just not letting the interviewer get away with any simple questions. The interviewer was up for it, fortunately. I’m guessing she’d learnt some lessons by then. For that interviewer to focus on sadness as if it’s a negative is plainly ridiculous (to me anyhow) … but might say something about where the interviewer was in her life? I do think some readers miss nuances in tone and just read the words.
Love your concluding sentence! Good one, Marcie.
I’ve heard that you have to do your homework to interview her, that she doesn’t suffer fools gladly; I believe I heard this in an interview, actually, so, presumably with an interviewer who prepared in advance! Heheh (A much later CBC interview, IIRC). That’s an excellent point about the interviewer’s experience(s). I wondered whether Gartner’s personal life urged her to take this kind of questioning, as though if she’d had such a Cinderella-and-the-Prince style marriage that she felt personally unrepresented; I wondered also whether her professional life elicited this tone, if perhaps she’d requested an interview previously, under other auspices, and been denied. There are so many moments in which both women set their mouths and tighten them, as though they are chewing back on what’s unsaid. I do agree, as you’ve said, that reading only the words on the page can lead to a very different understanding; maybe you need to hear Atwood’s voice to infer the wry laughter simmering beneath some of the narrator’s “fantasies” in this particular short story, for instance.
I’ve only read accounts of one or two Atwood interviews, to do with does she write SF? I’m not going to rehash the arguments, but I do wish to note that MA gets defensive when the reader doesn’t read as she intended. Does she ever say ‘Oh, did you read it that way? That’s interesting.’
That said, one of the many reasons I am not a writer, is that having to justify myself to interviewers would make me really angry. And imagine being interviewed week after week for every book.
Atwood’s one of the first writers I encountered who held that a book belonged to the reader after publication as much as to the writer (paraphrasing) with another Cdn writer, Timothy Findley, also triumphing this idea and transforming my ideas about writing and reading. And I have heard interesting discussions with Atwood and others, about different definitions and experiences and understandings, like the conversation between UKLG and MA about terms and trends in sci-fi. But here it feels to me like Gartner makes a pronouncement at the start and doesn’t make any specific references to sadness or rottenness or dismal situations so they could be discussed (or mention stories in which relationships between men and women figure more prominently than the one story she refers to): I find it hard to believe she read the collection, but maybe I’m too skeptical?
My goodness, what a phenomenally ridiculous interview. And I suspect Atwood has had to defend herself many times for not writing what people think she should. I just read a non-fiction piece where she’s discussing having villainesses for characters and the impression is that she’s been attacked by feminists for not making her women characters perfect and blameless (this was a lot late). Fascinating. Fortunately Atwood just keeps on doing what she does.
That sounds similar. It took me so by surprise that I could barely think for a time, because I was simply hoping for some interesting quotes about DG; maybe that’s how she felt, too, thinking she was to be discussing stories only to find herself defending them. Later in the interview, she mentions deciding to stand separate from the things that are said about her from the person she knows herself to be, and describes a visitor bringing something to show her so they could laugh together about what had been said (that they both knew to be untrue). You have to laugh or you’ll cry, she says. (Paraphrasing.)
Poor Atwood, that interview sounds horrible. Does Gartner think that literature’s job is to make her feel happy or something? Yikes.
I can’t track how many times I’ve read or heard variations on this, in which an interviewer’s ideas about her supersede her actual words or work…but I thought it was a recent phenomenon, and this interview is nearly fifty years old.
I bet she’s better at making a response to this kind of thing now 🙂
I’m guessing she’d be able to spot the patterns more quickly, that’s for sure! Instinct!