Martha Schabas
I’ve had this Tiffany lamp since I was a teenager. I read lots of important and formative books by its light. I had it stored away in a box for many years but now it sits in my bedroom again and delights all three of my kids. My baby is mesmerized by its brightness, my two-year-old points and names the colours of the glass, and my seven-year-old finds it comforting when he can’t sleep.
What do you feel is your best piece of work?
I’d like to say my best work is what I’m writing now because I want to believe that there’s something cumulative in all this, that I’m genuinely getting better at it, that the practice of writing has a positive slope. But another part of me would argue that writing that comes out right on the first try, in one swift and sustained expression, is always and necessarily my best work. It’s hard not to feel that there’s something fated and superior about work that lands on the page fully formed. Maybe that’s just superstitious.
What music have you been listening to lately?
A fair amount of Raffi with my kids. My two-year-old calls Baby Beluga “Baby Buddha,” an error that feels meaningful. The new album by Midlake is very pretty as is the debut album by Maple Glider. My home is quite chaotic, peace and quiet are always scarce, so if I do put on music I want it to be tidy, calming, organized. It might just be Glenn Gould playing some Bach.
Who is the last character you related to and why?
Amanda Seyfried as Elizabeth Holmes in The Dropout. She had me at the first episode, when she chastises a group of high school peers for not speaking exclusively in Mandarin on their immersion program in Beijing. It was a beautiful moment.
Have you ever failed at something you care about?
I wanted to be a professional ballet dancer.
Last gift you received?
My fiancé gave me a stack of books for my birthday and a beautiful silk blouse with puffed sleeves that didn’t fit.
Favourite photo you’ve taken?
A photo of Cloudgate Dance Theatre in the hills just northwest of Taipei. I took it on a foggy day in early December a few years ago. There are black clouds in the sky and the theatre is lit in a way that doesn’t make sense, enveloped in helixes of light. I can’t explain this.
Which season is the best?
Summer. I like climates that allow for the least amount of distinction between indoor and outdoor space.
Do you like to write in the morning or at night?
I like writing in the morning when I’ve just finished my coffee and there is still hope.
When did you first receive praise for your writing
It was for an essay on Lolita in grade eleven. I wanted to prove to my mom (a child psychiatrist) that the novel didn’t glorify the sexual abuse of a minor. I worked on it for weeks, grappling with literary theory for the first time, reading at least a dozen essays on Nabokov. When the teacher handed it back to me, he stammered and said, “Your writing just feels so good.” To a roomful of teenagers, this seemed full of innuendo, and everyone laughed, while both the teacher and I turned very red.
Latest book you’ve read or favourite book ever?
The Plains by Gerald Murnane is one of several favourites. It is a bizarre and beautiful novel, cryptic, mysterious and ferociously intelligent—a stylistic marvel halfway between Samuel Beckett and W.G. Sebald. I gave it to a friend who was living in Australia for a bit and who doesn’t read much. When I asked how she found it, her expression went completely blank and she said, “I had no idea what was going on for even a second.”
Anything you’d like to promote?
My new novel, My Face in the Light, which was just published by Knopf Canada!
Martha Schabas is the author of two novels: My Face in the Light, just published by Knopf Canada, and Various Positions, named a book of the year by The Globe and Mail, Quill & Quire and NOW Magazine and shortlisted for an Evergreen Fiction Award. Her essays, arts criticism and short fiction have appeared in publications including The Walrus, Hazlitt, The New Quarterly. She was The Globe and Mail’s dance critic from 2015-2020, where she also wrote about theatre and books.
