The short story author, AliceMunro, died at 92
A Memorino about a Canadian Craftsman: A Conversation with Shea Munro About Her Life in a Small Town
Munro was a craftsman and was known for her intricately paced short stories. She often lived in rural Ontario as her characters. She told an interviewer that she had the freedom to write when she lived in a small town. She didn’t think she could have been so brave if she’d lived in a town that had a higher cultural level. For a while, I was the only person who could do this in the world, but I didn’t tell anyone so I stopped doing it.
Munro was born in 1931, outside of Wingham Ontario. After college she moved to Victoria, British Columbia, and opened a bookstore with her then- husband, known asMunoir’s Books. Dance of the Happy Shades won Canada’s prestigious Governor’s General’s Award. That was the start of a career that would last for more than a dozen story collections and the novel Lives of Girls and Women.
She was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature the year after Dear Life was published, but she was “too frail” to attend the ceremonies. She had an interview where she was asked if she wanted young women to be inspired by her books and feel inspired to write. To which she replied, “I don’t care what they feel as long as they enjoy reading the book.”
“I would like people to find joy rather than inspiration.” I want people to enjoy my books and think of them as being related to their own lives.
