Getting Lit with Linda - The Canadian Literature Podcast

Getting Lit with Linda - The Canadian Literature Podcast

By Linda MorraEducationArtsBooks
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Getting Lit with Linda - The Canadian Literature Podcast episodes

  • Paper Postcards - Eden Robinson's "Traplines"

    Linda focuses on Indigenous writers in this podcast in view of Orange Shirt Day (every child matters!) and the inaugural National Day for Truth and Reconciliation. She recommends several writers (some of them featured on 49th shelf), including Cherie Dimaline and Joshua Whitehead.


    Postcards may offer glossy images of success or experiences that aren't real - instead, sometimes those images may obscure the turbulent underside of our lives. Beginning with her experience with depression (trigger warning), Linda addresses how misunderstandings arise from expectations about what one should feel and what one actually feels; she thus considers the Apple TV character, Ted Lasso, and his sage advice, "Be curious, not judgemental." She then looks at Eden Robinson's magnificent (and painful) story, "Traplines" (from the book of the same name, Traplines, published by Penguin/Random House) in which the narrator, Will, must navigate an abusive context (more trigger warnings) and try to discern how to act and what is options really are. All of this is rendered more complex by his deep sense of hunger (real and otherwise).


    Then, in the Takeaway, Linda recommends Naomi Fontaine's Manikanetish (translated by Luise von Flotow, published by House of Anansi), which was shortlisted for the Governor General's Award. You can find a longer review of this book in the Montreal Review of Books.


    She also thanks some of her listeners, including Arpita Ghosal at SesayArts Magazine.


    If you are suffering from depression, please reach out and get support. You are not alone.

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    19 min
  • Wayson Choy's The Jade Peony - Connecting Across Generations & Genders

    Remember Shirley Temple, that Hollywood cinema's icon of idealized (white) girlhood? Linda looks up a short clip, "On the Good Ship Lollipop," and feels uncomfortable (trigger warning here) and explains why she and some of her students shared that experience. She considers the importance of contextualizing or historicizing our responses to cultural artefacts -- but, even so, there is good reason to feel uncomfortable about Temple's childhood performances. That's not necessarily the case for our interpretation of the heroine of the first part of Wayson Choy's The Jade Peony.


    Topics include:

    • Shirley Temple's "On the Good Ship Lollipop"
    • Wayson Choy's The Jade Peony
    • Chinatown, Vancouver
    • Patriarchy and the male gaze
    • Repatriation of Chinese bones


    In the Takeaway section, she looks at Madelaine Caritas Longman's marvellous debut collection, The Danger Model (McGill Queen's Press), which unsurprisingly won the Concordia First Book Prize by the Quebec Writers' Federation.


    Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

    28 min
  • When the Body Complains - Jane Rule's Taking My Life and Sara Ahmed's Complaint!

    In this episode, addressing Jane Rule's Taking My Life (Talon Books), Linda discusses why bodies "complain" and what it means when they do. In the Takeaway section, she reviews Sara Ahmed's new book, Complaint (Duke University Press). In Complaint!, Ahmed examines institutional harassment and bullying, and how to read complaints that are lodged against such institutions. In the entirety of the episode, Linda is discussing how we respond to different forms of "grooming" (Ahmed) or bodily coercion - and why indeed the body complains.


    If you want to know more generally about Jane Rule, please visit the Queer Legends podcast, in which Shawn Dearn interviews Linda Morra about her life and work.

    Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

    32 min
  • "What Blossoms Long For" - Chantel Lavoie

    In this episode, and as part of the Sealey challenge, Linda interviews poet and scholar, Chantel Lavoie, about her love for the poetry of Margaret Atwood - in particular, the collections Morning in the Burned House (Penguin Random House), The Door (Penguin Random House), and Dearly (HarperCollins).


    Lavoie is herself a poet, as Linda notes at the outset of the episode: she published Where The Terror Lies with Quattro Books in 2012 and This is About Angels, Women, and Men with Manfield Press in 2019. Linda reflects on her first meeting with Lavoie, several years ago, when she had won the Books in Canada Prize, and cites from Lavoie's poems that won that year.


    Lavoie and Linda also invent a new cocktail - called the "Atwood martini."

    Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

    39 min
  • Thomas King's One Good Story, That One: Relationships & Stories
    We develop relationships with people and communities as we share stories with them--in fact, that is a sign of our role or place within the community--but we don't get to demand to hear them, especially when we are not a part of that community. In this episode, Linda examines Thomas King's collection, One Good Story, That One (published by HarperCollins), and particularly the story of the same title, with this idea in mind. She considers his literary technique in relation to Van Gogh's Starry Night (you can check out the painting in this Van Gogh immersive exhibition) and then his other story and graphic novel, Borders. The latter is relevant in relation to the Takeway portion of the podcast, in which she interviews her former student Darrin Prine about the genre. Darrin introduced her to Spice & Wolf (by Isuna Hasekura, with illustrations by Jū Ayakura), and in this section, he also makes reference to Goblin Slayer (by Kumo Kagyu), Watchmen (by Alan Moore and Dave Gibbon), Middlewest (by Skottie Young and Jorge Corona), and Full Metal Alchemist (by Hiromu Arakawa).

    Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

    23 min
  • Our Daily Heroes: Nino Ricci's Lives of the Saints
    In reflecting about her father and her visit with him to his small Italian village some years ago, Linda draws comparisons with Nino Ricci's Lives of the Saints (Penguin/Random House), in which the young male protagonist, Vittorio, must work out how he feels about his mother who flies in the face of the strict moral codes of the Italian town. With reference to other Italian-Canadian writers -- Terri Favro, Connie Guzzo-McParland, Pier Giorgio Di Cicco -- and also the audio book read by Marco Timpano (with great thanks to Penguin/Random House for permissions), the television version of Ricci's novel and Frances Mayes, Under the Tuscan Sun, and Madelena, the episode addresses the patriarchal conditions for women in Italy, but also what it means to see our parents as more than just parents, but as people with their own lives, dreams, and regrets. In the Takeaway section -- and perhaps a counterpoint to the episode's discussion -- Linda looks at and recommends Dior's Petit Dictionnaire de La Mode, which she picked up at the recent Dior Exhibit at the McCord Museum in Montreal, Quebec.

    Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

    17 min
  • Literature Heals and Connects Us: Heather O'Neill's "Messages in Bottles"
    In this episode, Heather O'Neill's short story, "Messages in Bottles" (from Daydreams of Angels, published by HarperCollins in 2014) becomes the focal point of a discussion about why distance does not necessarily impede intimacy--sometimes, in fact, it helps us to be or feel more closely connected--and in that process, literature may play an important part. In her takeaway, Linda chats about her newest "discovery," Souvankham Thammavongsa's Found (Pedlar Press 2007). Check out this video with Thammavongsa speaking about and reading from Found.

    Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

    21 min
  • Bonus Episode: Interview with Lori Schubert, Executive Director of the Quebec Writers' Federation
    Linda sits in the backyard of Lori Schubert, the Executive Director of the Quebec Writers' Federation, to chat with her about the organization's history, her role in it, and the programs it offers to its members across the province of Quebec, including its database of Quebec writers and its awards. And the two just enjoy a beautiful day outside, at the end of a long period of pandemic restrictions....

    Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

    26 min
  • How Remembering Defines You - Lorena Gale's Je Me Souviens
    In this episode, Linda remembers how she met actor and writer Lorena Gale in Vancouver, British Columbia - and how acts of remembering define who you are, as Gale's play, Je Me Souviens (Talon Press), renders clear; she connects the history and significance of license plates in Quebec to Gale's journey of self-discovery to show how Gale navigates carefully the challenges of identity in the province -- both when Gale lived there and then in retrospect. In the take-away section, Linda considers the collection, Chronicling the Days: Dispatches from a Pandemic, a project conceived by the Quebec Writers' Federation and produced in conjunction with Guernica Press, as an early provincial-based response to the pandemic. (With apologies for the recording's lack of clarity this episode!)

    Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

    20 min
  • Bonus Episode: Interview with Marco Timpano, Author of 25 Things I Wish I Knew Before I Started My Podcast
    In this episode, Linda chats with her co-producer (yes, that's right - her co-producer) and long-standing friend, Marco Timpano, about his career as a podcaster, and his recent publication, 25 Things I Wish I Knew Before I Started My Podcast. He reads from the book and, drawing upon his own experiences as a podcaster, explains some of the things he really wished he did know.

    Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

    25 min

About Getting Lit with Linda - The Canadian Literature Podcast

From the publisher's feed

Using her expertise as a seasoned literature professor, Linda M. Morra develops provocative, timely insights about books from Canada and elsewhere to show why stories are relevant for all of us.…

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