♪ (upbeat) ♪ >> Jim Deeks: Hello, I'm Jim Deeks.

Welcome to the very first edition of Canada Files , featuring one-on-one discussions with some of Canada's most prominent and successful people from all walks of life.

Our very first guest on this series is probably the most renowned writer on the entire planet right now, Margaret Atwood.

She has over 60 published books of both fiction and non-fiction during her career.

Margaret has won the highly coveted Booker Prize twice, including this past year for her highly-acclaimed novel, The Testaments.

Which is the sequel to her dystopian masterpiece of 1985, The Handmaid's Tale .

At forescore years and counting, Margaret Atwood is... as the French would say, a tour de force .

Margaret, for lovers of fiction and intelligent non-fiction you've been a well-known and revered writer for nearly 50 years.

to your credit.

I daresay, the phenomenal success of The Handmaid's Tale and the sequel that was just launched last fall, The Testaments, has put you in a different stratosphere of celebrity.

Something that you probably never would have imagined even five years ago.

Is this new level of fame something that you're loving?

Or are you thinking it's just all too much or it's a little overdue?

>> Margaret: (Laughs) That's a good option.

No, I'm not thinking that.

I'm thinking this is insane .

I'm also thinking if this happened to somebody at an earlier stage in their career, it would probably ruin their life.

Because it's like being the high school football star.

What do you do then for the rest of your life?

But I don't have a lot of 'rest of my life', so I'm not too bothered about that.

>> Jim: So you're enjoying it.

>> Margaret: Of course.

>> Jim: Let's talk about The Handmaid's Tale .

What was it about the 1980s when you wrote that book that was so dystopian for you at that time?

>> Margaret: We had the '60s which included, you'll recall, the civil rights movement, the anti-Vietnam War movement, and culminated with the beginning of second-wave feminism which was very active in the '70s.

In the '80s, there was a political change.

In comes a new wave of conservatism, which in this day and age, we'd probably consider some form of muted liberalism.

>> Jim: Led by Ronald Reagan.

>>: Led, or figureheaded by Ronald Reagan.

We saw the defeat of the equal rights amendment with Phyllis Schlafly heading up that.

We have a little tribute to her in The Testaments .

There's the Schlafly café with pink tablecloths.

So, I wrote The Handmaid's Tale in the middle of the '80s.

It was an answer to the question, if America were to have a totalitarianism... I was very alert to totalitarianisms, because I had lived through a number of them.

If it were to have a totalitarianism, what kind of totalitarianism would it be?

It wouldn't be, "Hi, my name is Uncle Joe... and let's all be communists."

It would not be that.

It would be more likely some kind of religious figureheaded thing.

Like a pretended religious thing used as a weapon to bash people over the head and get them into line.

Because they'd done it before.

That was my postulate and the '80s was a push-back decade pushing back against the rights that women had achieved.

There was a push-back against that.

>> Jim: Fast forward now to 2017.

>> Margaret: Why did I do a sequel?

>> Jim: What led to the resurgence of popularity of The Handmaid's Tale ?

Was it the very excellently, well-done television series or was it indeed, the advent of Donald Trump?

>> Margaret: It started before that.

In the two Obama elections, it was already a meme .

So people were saying about the things that were coming out of the mouths of wise Republicans such as, "Women are like cows".

(Laughs) "They should just have to carry dead babies to term."

You know, stuff like that.

They actually said those things.

It was a meme in the two previous elections.

When Donald Trump got elected, everybody making the show, because we were already making it, we woke up the next morning and we said, " We're in a different show."

Not that the show changed, the frame around the show changed so that it would be perceived differently, and it was.

Instead of, "Wooh, look at what we avoided", as it had been in the Obama elections, it was "Here it comes."

>> Jim: Let's go back to the beginning of your career >> Margaret: That's a long time ago.

(Laughs) >> Jim: In some people's minds but in fact, it's been a pretty whirlwind career, I must say.

You've said that you decided to become a writer at about age sixteen.

I wonder, if at that point, you recognized that you really had a talent and perhaps... I don't want to say a destiny, but a future as a writer?

Did you think I really don't want to be a secretary, or a housewife or a nurse?

Maybe I can make a living as a journalist and have a career that way.

Did you see yourself as a writer writer?

>> Margaret: I was quite insane.

(Both laugh) Yes, I absolutely saw myself as a writer writer.

I was willing to do those other things such as be a journalist, really almost anything, because I knew I needed a day job.

I did have a number of day jobs.

I was discouraged from being a journalist at that time because when my parents heard I wanted to be a writer, they bit their tongues until they were about this big.

Then they said, "How are you going to support yourself?"

I said, "Oh, I'll be a journalist!"

(Chuckles) They happened to have a second cousin who was a journalist, and had him over to dinner, and he said, "If you're going to be a journalist," this was in the middle of the '50s as a female person, "You'll be writing the obituaries or the women's page."

I thought, "That doesn't sound like a lot of fun."

So I reluctantly went to university, not into biology as they had hoped, but into Honours English.

>> Jim: This may sound like a dumb question.

How hard is it for you to write?

Is it a struggle or does it totally come naturally?

>> Margaret: Both.

Some people really write because they have something to say.

The writing part is hard for them.

I was the other way around.

Like a lot of young writers in their teens, you write stuff.

You think it's good.

You think you have something to say but actually you don't.

You don't know that you're practising your writing skills, but that's what you're doing.

I don't think I wrote anything that I would stand behind now, until I was about 24.

>> Jim: Very interesting.

Tell us how you do it.

How you go about it.

I know you handwrite a lot, and you type a lot.

But, do you sit down and type away madly for hours, and force yourself to stop?

Do you sit down and say, "500 words a day.

No more, no less, every day until this book is done."

>> Margaret: More like that.

Of course, it's very erratic.

Some days you write quite a lot and other days, you don't.

Do you know what a rolling barrage is?

>> Jim: Do tell!

>> Margaret: It's a military term.

It's what they did at Vimy Ridge .

One of the famous World War Onebattles which was a Canadian battle.

After Vimy Ridge , they never lost one.

In fact, so successful were they perceived as being, that they were in trench coat ads.

The Canadian says, "This is the trench coat I prefer."

This really happened.

You're supposed to run forward to a count, duck down, and the artillery shoots over your heads.

If you got it wrong, it hits you.

So the writing and typing for me usually goes like that.

The handwriting is the running forward.

Then there's a pause while the typing catches up to it.

Then you go forward with the handwriting, and the typing catches up.

But while I'm typing from my otherwise illegible handwriting, there are moments when I think, "What is that word?".

(Chuckles) >> Jim: I gather your spelling is not that good so you may be stumped.

>> Margaret: It's not the spelling, it's the handwriting .

Spelling is not an obstacle for me.

I'm like a lot of writers.

I spell by ear.

But other people can fix that.

My mother said rather caustically, when I said I was going to be a writer, "Well, if you're going to be a writer, you'll need to learn to spell."

I said, "Others will do that for me".

And they have.

>> Jim: When you're writing, are you more of a crafter of words and images or are you more of an actress impersonating the roles of the characters that you've created?

Or are you a stage manager literally putting people into scenes and working them off each other?

>> Margaret: I don't think those are either or's.

(Laughs) I think it all happens at once.

That's why I was interested when they came to me and said, "We're doing this series on Shakespeare and the mandate is to pick a play, any play and write a modern novel inspired by it."

That's why I chose The Tempest .

Because in it, Prospero is all of those things.

It's the closest Shakespeare ever came to writing about himself and what he did.

He's a stage manager.

He's an actor in the play.

He's certainly a crafter of words and a crafter of the action.

He directs it all.

So he is all of those things.

>> Jim: How much do you re-write?

>> Margaret: A lot.

I re-write a lot in various stages.

I re-write while I'm doing the typing of my own handwriting.

I re-write once I have something that has a beginning, a middle and an end.

You know the cut-and-paste function on your computer?

That used to be real cutting and pasting.

You would actually cut with scissors and paste things, with paste !

So I do that -I move things around, and edit the text itself Then when you think you can't do anymore, it goes to the editors and they have a go .

Finally, you sit down with the copy editor That is a page by page exercise in which he says, "You used this word on page 15 and you used it again on page 362.

Does that bother you?"

>> Jim: Do you ever go back to your published works years later and re-read them and if so, how do they stand up for you?

>> Margaret: (Chuckles) I haven't done the whole thing.

So if I'm talking to someone who's been immersed in my work, they probably know it better than I do, at that point.

From time to time, I go back and look at things, because something has come up.

So I think it's the usual, with a lot of writers, to go back to the early work and say, "Uh....I don't think I would do that quite that way now."

But everything you write is of its time.

So you can't escape that.

Ivanhoe by Walter Scott is set in medieval times, but it's a Victorian novel.

>> Jim: Have you ever written a book or a story or poetry and looked at it recently and thought, "That really wasn't my best work"?

Are you self-critical in that respect?

>> Margaret: Oh sure.

But I've also looked at things and thought, "That is really creepy.... because now it's happened."

>> Jim: Do you look at what you've done and say, "Wow, that's awesome!"

>> Margaret: I do look at it and think, "I don't remember doing this.... but it's pretty good."

I can do that.

I can also think, "I don't remember doing this and it's pretty bad."

You have both experiences.

It's like anything else in your life.

>> Jim: What's your favourite Margaret Atwood novel?

>> Margaret: I never ever answer that question.

Why?

The others will hear and they'll be very angry.

They'll get back at me.

They'll say, "We've spent all this time with you and you're so ungrateful."

>> Jim: It's not always the last book you've completed?

>> Margaret: No.

It's likely to be the one I'm writing now.

Because if it isn't the one you're writing now, why are you writing it?

>> Jim: Canada has certainly produced some wonderful writers over the last 150 years, but in the last 50 to 75 years, there are some great names.

Unfortunately, Canadians know these names, but not a lot of people outside of our country do.

There are some exceptions, you...obviously.

Alice Monroe, who won the Nobel Prize , Mordecai Richler, Robertson Davies, Michael Ondaatje.

Those are names that... >> Margaret: Carol Shields >> Jim: Carol Shields, Margaret Lawrence is another.

There are a lot of Canadian writers that we know that the rest of the world doesn't know.

>> Margaret: There are a lot of English writers in England that English people know but the rest of the world doesn't.

There are a lot of French ones, etc.

It's normal.

>> Jim: Are Canadian writers as good as the best?

Or are we under-rated and under-valued because we're such a small country?

>> Margaret: You're very fond of 'either/or', aren't you?

(Laughs) >> Margaret: Those two things can exist in the same space.

It took awhile to get Canadian writers acknowledged, because people were taking points off for the fact that they were Canadian.

It was just the age of just recently post-colonialism.

Not only in Canada, but in countries like New Zealand and Australia, and people in India who wrote in English.

They just got points off for not being from 'the really good place'.

It's just as Quebec writers got points off for not being from Fra That, I think, has evened out somewhat.

It hasn't so much for Quebec because Quebec literature is very particular.

It's very specific to Quebec, and often other people just can't get it; they just don't grasp it, with the exception of some writers.

It is quite particular.

Canadian writing translates into other readerships quite well in this day and age.

So it's North American, without being American which in the minds of some is a 'plus'.

In previous years, it was a negative.

It was taken for granted that either Canadian literature didn't exist at all, or that it was 'second rate something else'.

That is why I wrote a book in 1972 about why Canadian literature was different from other literatures in English.

Why wouldn't it be?

The place is different.

>> Does that still apply?

What you wrote in 1972 about Canadian literature?

>> I don't know, and I'm not going to find out, because that was a lot of work .

>> A lot of reading!

>> Margaret: I did it for a couple reasons; Number one, I was working with a small publishing company.

We were always thinking of ways to make money to support our list unknown novelists and weird poets.

Do you know The Idiot's Guides to this and that?

We actually did the first Idiot's Guides , except they weren't called that.

One of them was about law and how to write your own divorce and will.

One of them was the first venereal disease book.

It was called VD.

We got through warts but not AIDS because that hadn't happened yet.

We were sitting around in a meeting and I said, "Why don't I write a VD of Canadian literature because it doesn't exist yet."

There is no accessible... 'There is a Canadian Literature' book.

So that's what that book was.

I wrote it because it didn't exist, because it would make some money for the publishing company, and because I thought people needed it.

Judging by all of the people who ask me questions like, "There isn't any Canadian literature, is there?"

or "Isn't it just second rate English or American?"

I felt they really needed this book.

>> Jim: And you did it.

>> Margaret: I did, and then I got in (bleep) for it, as usual.

>> There is a word we'll be bleeping out.. (laughs) >> Margaret: Oh come on, that's a common English word.

>> Let's talk... >> I got in trouble for it.

How about that?

>> Jim: Let's talk about awards.

You've won the Booker Prize twice.

Well, one and a half times.

I'm not sure how you define it.

Your name is on the Booker Prize twice.

You've won Canada's Governor General's Award .

>> Margaret: Twice >> You've been honored over twenty honorary degrees from universities including Oxford, Cambridge... Harvard and Sorbonne .

>> Margaret: Wasn't that fun.

>> Jim: Good on you.

What is the greatest honour that you've received?

You just got a recent one from the Queen.

>> Yes,that was very honourable and a lot of fun as well but I would never, ever... It's like, "What is your favourite novel?"

I will not choose amongst these things.

Why should any of them be relegated to second rank?

I will tell you about one that you don't know about.

I got the Swedish Humour Award.

I bet you didn't know there was one.

>> Jim: You wouldn't think the Swedes were the most humourous people in the world, as wonderful as they are.

>> Margaret: You'd be surprised.

They can be very funny, after a certain point in the evening.

>> Jim: Full of schnapps ?

>> Margaret: It helps.

I got the Swedish Humour Award but I couldn't collect it so my publishers went.

It took place in an amphitheatre in the rain.

They got quite wet.

They got the award which is an engraved crystal bowl.

Then somebody stole it.

So I won the Swedish Humour Award but... I don't have the Swedish Humour Award.

(pauses) >> Jim: Because it got lost in the flood?

>> Margaret: No, it got stolen!

>> Jim: You've been honoured by your country, not only with the Governor General's Award twice but with the Order of Canada which is an honour, that almost every recipient seems to believe is the pinnacle that a Canadian can achieve.

You've always been fiercely Canadian throughout your career.

What does being Canadian mean to you?

>> Margaret: That's a minefield these days!

But it always has been.

We are ahead of our time in that we've always been very diverse.

We've always had to recognize that in some way.

Not sufficiently to my mind but we've always had to do that.

Other countries are catching up.

Think of it that way.

For awhile, we got disparaged because we didn't have one big symbolic thing that people could point to.

I remember the magazine, Saturday Night , running a contest which was to complete the sentence.. "As Canadian as... " As in "As American as apple pie, etc" The winner was -- "As Canadian as possible under the circumstances."

>> Jim: Let me ask you about The Testamentsbefore we finish.

It was published last September to great acclaim from the critics, and to a world waiting for more of Gilead .

I think, hopefully it answered their craving.

Was it fun for you to go back to Gilead and to go back to those characters?

It strikes me that this is probably the first novel that you were almost compelled to write, by your public.

>> Margaret: (Hesitates) No.... not exactly.

I'd resisted that call for quite a long time.

Because I thought that what they meant, and what they did mean, was to continue the story of Offred in her voice.

Which I would not have been able to do.

You can't really do that without having it sound like an imitation of itself.

So, I took a different approach.

I went forward 16 years, and picked up two characters who were quite young in The Testaments .

If fact, one of them hadn't been born yet.

And another character, everybody's favourite...Lydia.

I told the story from those three points of view, as Gilead has entered its middle to late period.

>> Jim: Did you love going back into that universe?

>> Margaret: What does love mean, in relation to what a writer does?

It was a stimulating challenge.

I'm not sure that love is the right word.

But it was a stimulating challenge >> Jim: The last question is, do you plan or expect to breathe your last breath with either a pen in hand or hands on a typewriter?

Or do you see yourself saying, "I've written everything I want to write.

I'm going to retire now, or at some point."

>> Margaret: We do not know the answer to that question.

>> Jim: Let's leave it there.

>> Margaret: You do not know the answer and I don't.

Not using the ' royal' we , we'll wait and see.

It depends how cuckoo I get, doesn't it?

>> Jim: It's been a delight, Margaret.

Thank you so much for joining us.

Thank you Thank you for watching Canada Files .

We hope you'll join us on our next episode.

See you then.

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