Getting Lit with Linda

Linda met Dr. Wendy Wong at a conference in Kelowna, organized by Dr. Karis Shearer (1:25) and hosted by SpokenWeb (1:20), when Dr. Wong spoke about her book, We, the Data (a nod to the preamble of the United States Constitution, 4:10) -- and, since then, Linda has been obsessed. Being an expert on archival theory in relation to women writers' materials, Linda has digitization - and now datafication (7:45) - very much on the brain (and probably on her computer too).

Does anyone remember that series, New Canadian Literature (NCL), produced by McClelland & Stewart? In this interview, Linda discusses the very much new and improved series, Kanata Classics (15:06), with Stephanie Sinclair, the publisher of McClelland & Stewart -- with special guest feature, Holly, her cat.

In this episode, Linda examines the resurgence of the memoir, and what readers expect - and what she expects - when we pick one up. While the first part of the episode examines the features and history of the memoir, the last part is devoted to the wonderful new memoir by Susan Swan, Big Girls Don't Cry.. Stay tuned for an interview with Swan in a future episode!

In this episode, Linda thinks about Atlantis as a way of considering the dystopian novel, Cherie Dimaline’s The Marrow Thieves (Penguin Random House). Using James Cairns’ In Crisis, On Crisis: Essays in Trouble Times (Wolsak & Wyne), she thinks about why we read novels that are apocalyptic in nature. Cairns, she notes, refers to Rumaan Alam’s Leave the World Behind (HarperCollins) and shows how we get some measure of satisfaction from reading them. Dimaline’s novel may offer that kind of satisfaction, but it is very much based in Indigenous community and what Daniel Heath Justice would call “embodied sovereignty.”