"Now is the Time that Artists Must Get to Work" - Zilla Jones' The World So Wide

Season 6, Episode 79

As a result of Zilla Jones’ The World So Wide, slated for publication with Cormorant Books on April 26, 2025, Linda reflects on opera (specifically Verdi’s La Forza Del Destino) – historically an elitist art form, but one that Felicity Alexander, the protagonist of Jones’ novel, in part challenges and overcomes through the very successes of her career. The trajectory of that career takes a darker turn when she finds herself in Grenada during the 1983 American invasion of that country – not an untimely revisioning of history in view of the current American political situation (27:40; 28:50).

Linda also speaks about Verdi’s La forza del destino with Renata Tibaldi as Leonore and her father's love for opera (2:15), before she turns to the interview with Zilla Jones to speak about the following:

• Opera’s potential as an artform vs. its polarizing, and its elitism as art form (3:20; 12:30)

• Arts vs. politics (13:30)

• Sara Ahmed’s What’s the Use? (5:00; 6:15)

• Of what use is art in a time like this? (6:00; 31:45)

• Shani Mootoo (Season 3, Episode 6, 6:00)

• Decolonization and racial politics (12:15)

• The novel as a colonial construct (16:15)

• Dionne Brand, Salvaging the Wreck (16:03)

• Robinson Crusoe (16:15)

• Felicity as mixed-race heroine (17:30; 33:20)

• Kathleen Battle (18:46; 19:00)

• Grenada (history of, 20:45, and its “Revo,” 23:10; Red Sky Revolution, 23.20)

• Jones' research for the novel (24:35)

• The history of the Panama Canal (27:40)

• Toni Morrison (31:50)

• Gender and racialized motherhood (34:10)

• Felicity (naming of) (39:30)