Helen Humphreys & Kate Pullinger

Bearing Witness: Helen Humphreys & Kate Pullinger

Helen Humphreys, Kate Pullinger and Deborah Dundas

Bearing Witness: Helen Humphreys & Kate Pullinger

Helen Humphreys, Kate Pullinger and Deborah Dundas

4:00pm

Thursday, October 22, 2020

45 mins

Canadian authors Kate Pullinger and Helen Humphreys will discuss how bearing witness, homelessness and the long-term effects of trauma translate, as demonstrated in their latest novels, both set in the mid-twentieth century. In Forrest Green, Governor General Award-winning author Pullinger presents a man on the run from himself, first as a young golden boy and then as a Word War II soldier and eventually a nomadic working man who cannot believe he deserves love. In Rabbit Foot Bill, Harbourfront Festival Prize-winner Helen Humphreys introduces us to a lonely boy in a prairie town whose friendships and understanding of the world shatter before him when he witnesses a shocking murder. Don’t miss this special Festival opening night double interview.

Interviewer: Deborah Dundas

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Canadian authors Kate Pullinger and Helen Humphreys will discuss how bearing witness, homelessness and the long-term effects of trauma translate, as demonstrated in their latest novels, both set in the mid-twentieth century. In Forrest Green, Governor General Award-winning author Pullinger presents a man on the run from himself, first as a young golden boy and then as a Word War II soldier and eventually a nomadic working man who cannot believe he deserves love. In Rabbit Foot Bill, Harbourfront Festival Prize-winner Helen Humphreys introduces us to a lonely boy in a prairie town whose friendships and understanding of the world shatter before him when he witnesses a shocking murder. Don’t miss this special Festival opening night double interview.

Interviewer: Deborah Dundas

English captioning is available for this video. Please click the ‘CC’ button in the video toolbar to turn it on.

Featured Authors

Helen Humphreys
Helen Humphreys is an acclaimed and award-winning author of fiction, non-fiction and poetry. Her work includes novels Machine Without Horses, The Evening Chorus, Coventry and After image. Her nonfiction includes The Ghost Orchard, The Frozen Thames and the memoir Nocturne. She has won the Rogers Writers’ Trust Fiction Prize, the Toronto Book Award, and has been a finalist for the Governor General’s Award for Fiction, the Trillium Book Prize, the Lambda Literary Award and CBC Radio’s Canada Reads. The recipient of the Harbourfront Festival Prize for literary excellence, Helen Humphreys lives in Kingston, Ontario.

Read more about Helen Humphreys

Kate Pullinger
Kate Pullinger grew up in British Columbia. In 2009, her novel The Mistress of Nothing won the Governor General's Literary Award for Fiction. Her prize-winning digital fiction projects include the ground-breaking title for children Inanimate Alice and, most recently, a ghost story for smartphones, Breathe. Flight Paths: A Networked Novel was the inspiration for her 2014 novel, Landing Gear. She is currently Professor of Creative Writing and Digital Media at Bath Spa University, England. Forest Green is her 10th novel.

Read more about Kate Pullinger

Deborah Dundas
Deborah Dundas is the Books Editor at the Toronto Star with a broad background in the media, including stints in business, lifestyle and national and city politics, in Canada and while working and living in Northern Ireland. She has interviewed some of the world’s most recognizable authors including Salman Rushdie, Margaret Atwood, Colson Whitehead, Jonathan Franzen, Zadie Smith and John Irving. She regularly appears on stage, television and radio and is deeply involved with the literary community, often acting as a juror or host. She studied English and Political Science at Toronto’s York University and is currently pursuing an MFA at the University of King’s College.

Read more about Deborah Dundas

Helen Humphreys & Kate Pullinger

4:00pm

Thursday, October 22

45 mins

What to read

Rabbit Foot Bill by , Forest Green by ,
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