My festival starts with two heavy hitters - back-to-back Booker Prize winners - on Wednesday 24 May 2023. I hadn't planned on starting my festival so early in the week, but as Evaristo was not on the weekend program, I wanted to make sure I was able to hear her speak. As a bonus, Shehan Karunatilaka was speaking right after her. It was an excellent evening which really set the tone for the festival that followed.
Bernardine Evaristo: A Writing Life
British author Bernardine Evaristo won the Booker Prize in 2019 for Girl, Woman, Other. The prestige of this award saw many of her previous novels re-released to great acclaim and a wider audience. In 2022 she published her memoir Manifesto: On Never Giving Up. She was interviewed on stage by the brilliant Sisonke Msimang, who asked intelligent and engaging questions.
Evaristo spoke of her early life as one of eight children. Her father was a disciplinarian who didn't trust tradespeople so their ramshackle house was filled with half-finished DIY projects, like an uninstalled bathtub erect in the corner of a room. Her mother was a white English catholic woman and her father was a Nigerian migrant. Her maternal grandmother loved her grandchildren but was racist, never accepting her daughter's marriage and never having photos of her grandchildren in the house. I loved how Evaristo described her grandmother's neighbourhood as being filled with 'curtain-twitchers'.
Msimang asked about racism and how Evaristo appeared to be incredibly hardy, experiencing racism without taking it personally. Evaristo explained that 'British racism is quite sophisticated.' She was seen as a 'half-caste' and didn't quite fit in.
They spoke about literature and how when Evaristo was growing up the only black authors available were American, but the experience of African-American women was different to her own. She loves Toni Morrison, and wishes she had a book like Girl Woman Other when she was growing up as it would have blown her mind.
Msimang asked how winning the Booker Prize changed Evaristo's life. She said it changed her career, but not her life. It also meant for the first time she was able to make a living as a writer and her back catalogue could now reach new audiences.
After the session I met Evaristo when she signed a copy of Girl Woman Other for me.
Shehan Karunatilaka: The Seven Moons of Maali Almeida
Sri Lankan novelist Shehan Karunatilaka won the 2022 Booker Prize for his satirical novel The Seven Moons of Maali Almeida. In this session he spoke with Michael Williams about his work. I really enjoyed this session. Michael Williams is an excellent interviewer - quick witted, intelligent and engaging.
Williams asked if the novel was intended to be allegorical. Karunatilaka said 'I thought I was writing a straight forward ghost story. I was not trying to do political commentary'. He said the character of Maali, a journalist, was inspired by the unsolved murders of many journalists that occurred during the time. He spoke about Richard de Zoysa, the Sri Lankan journalist who was abducted and murdered in 1990, his body dumped on a beach. No one has been held responsible for this murder.
They then spoke about Karunatilaka's portrayal of the afterlife which Williams described as 'like life but worse'. Apparently there is a lot of admin in the afterlife. Karunatilaka said 'when you have a ghost narrating a story, how do they spend their days?' He created a set of rules - ghosts can only go where they have been in life, they travel by the wind, and can go wherever someone speaks their name. Essentially, ghosts will cease to exist when they are no longer remembered by anyone living.
Williams asked why he decided to write in the second person. Karunatilaka said his initial draft was in third person. But 'the voice in your head is second person' and 'the voice in your head survives the death of the body'. When speaking about his beliefs about the afterlife, Karunatilaka said he doesn't know but that doesn't mean it doesn't exist. He is open to possibilities.
They talked about the Booker Prize win and how in 2017 George Sanders won for his own take on the afterlife, Lincoln in the Bardo. Karunatilaka admires that book and said he thought he wouldn't win because they both were narrated by ghosts in the afterlife.
What a great start to SWF2023!
Book signings
I love having books signed by authors. It means so much to me to meet writers who made an impact on me as a reader, and to have a signed copy of a beloved book is greatly treasured.
Books signed by authors today:
- Bernardine Evaristo - Girl, Woman, Other (2019)
- Shehan Karunatilaka - The Seven Moons of Maali Almeida (2022)
Today's signings add to my collection of Booker Prize winning novels signed by the author at past Sydney Writers' Festivals, including:
- Thomas Keneally - Schindler's Ark (1982)
- Eleanor Catton - The Luminaries (2013)
- Richard Flanagan - The Narrow Road to the Deep North (2014)
- Marlon James - A Brief History of Seven Killings (2015)
- Damon Galgut - The Promise (2021)
Read more about my SWF2023 here:
- SWF2023 - Overall impressions
- Day One - Bernardine Evaristo; Shehan Karunatilaka
- Day Two - Sophie Cunningham; Anne Casey-Hardy; Fiona Kelly McGregor; Brigitta Olubas; Robbie Arnott; George Monbiot; Sarah Holland-Batt; Jane Harper; Richard Fidler; Peter Frankopan
- Day Three - Geraldine Brooks; Sally Colin-James; Pip Williams; Eleanor Catton; Raina MacIntyre; Clementine Ford; Colson Whitehead
- Day Four - Jennifer Robinson; Hedley Thomas; Helen Garner; Sarah Krasnostein; Pip Williams; Richard Flanagan; Eleanor Catton; Colson Whitehead; Tracey Lien; Sam Neill; Bryan Brown
- Day Five - Barrie Cassidy; Laura Tingle; Niki Savva; Amy Remeikis; Margot Saville; Simon Holmes A Court; Helen Haines; Margaret Simons; Paddy Manning; Kerry O'Brien; Thomas Mayo