Words At Large

Neil Bissoondath talks with Shelagh Rogers about his new novel, his elusive main character and why living with secrets can be tricky

Posted by Kimberly Walsh on December 02 at 12:00 AM

Listen here:

The Soul of All Great DesignsThe main character in Neil Bissoondath’s latest novel, The Soul of All Great Designs (Cormorant Books), has an identity crisis of sorts. Alec never reveals who he truly is to anyone, and his life is a tissue of lies.

In this feature interview from The Next Chapter, Bissoondath talks with Shelagh Rogers about why people try to disguise who they really are, and how normal it is to heighten certain aspects of yourself depending on your company and surroundings. But this chameleon-like behaviour gets out of hand for Alec, with disastrous results.

Bissoondath grew up in Trinidad and immigrated to Canada in 1973. He now lives in Quebec City, where he teaches at Laval University. His fiction includes A Casual Brutality and The Worlds Within Her, which was shortlisted for the Governor General's Literary Award. He has also published non-fiction, including Selling Illusions: The Cult of Mulitculturalism in Canada, a hard-hitting attack on Canada’s multiculturalism policy.

There’s plenty more in the podcast of the show: Lawrence Hill talks about his latest novel, The Book of Negroes, being on this year’s Canada Reads list. And celebrated painter Charles Pachter discusses M is for Moose (Cormorant Books), a collection of his best-known paintings.

First aired November 29, 2008 on The Next Chapter. [runs 18:59]

The Next Chapter airs Saturday at 3 p.m. (3:30 NT) on CBC Radio One.

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