Interview with Margaret Laurence Part II

A critic once said of A Jest of God that Rachel really wasn't worth writing about because she was no more interesting than anybody you might sit next to in the streetcar. And I thought that doesn't say much about the book but it says a lot about that critic. (- Margaret Laurence)

It's interesting to compare the 1966 interview with this 1978 NFB vignette of Margaret Laurence. Here she's a literary icon in her early 50′s with a great body of prize-winning work behind her.

The Diviners, my favourite of her books, had been published 4 years prior, and she would write no more novels. However, ahead of her were still several children's books and a memoir, which was published posthumously. What struck me most in this interview was her respect for ordinary people and her ability to see the extraordinary in them.

Filed under: CanLit, Interesting, Literary Tagged: A Jest of God, Margaret Laurence video, The Diviners