Shields’ obituary on NPR and also a previously recorded interview with Shields primarily discussing her last book Unless:
NPR Interview with Carol Shields (2003)
And, something new I just discovered:another online interview with Carol.
[W]e’ve got to blurt — [...] blurt bravely and get some words on paper and have lots of conversations with lots of people. I think that’s very important — connecting and having conversations, that’s a huge part of my life. Being interested. Somehow, I’ve been able to remain interested in everything that’s happening, and you want to hang on to that as long as you can.
–Carol Shields quoted in an interview with Eleanor Wachtel in January 2002. This was her last interview with Carol before she passed on in the Summer of 2003. This interview is recorded in a lovely new book: Random Illuminations.
I’m alive — just barely — but am consumed with the work of writing and grading. Conference experience was good — check out In the Middle or Literature Compass for more on the proceedings at Kzoo. I didn’t get to have all the authorship conversations I wanted to, which was frustrating since I went out on a limb (again) and stepped outside my primary field (even though some people keep telling me I’m really a medievalist, even though I’m not so much). I did hear several good papers/conversations on queer theory and medieval lit, which was helpful. Saw some friends and profs that I wouldn’t normally get to visit with. Also went to the famous “dance” and did some mean MC Hammer moves with my old super-brilliant college pal. Had an all around a good time but now I have to finish everything up for the term so I can move onto other things.
“Maybelle brought her blocked husband smoked fish wrapped in butcher’s paper. Also wonderful pears. Also gossip, sweet candy. But the truth is, though it is very seldom admitted to, there is very little anyone can do for anyone else. Interesting excursions can be planned, people invited to dinner, noodle puddings produced, orange juice squeezed, lamps left burning, bed covers turned invitingly down. Kisses can be dropped on the tops of heads, and news brought from one person’s world to another, but in the end it’s a matter of waiting things out in an improvised shelter and thinking as kindly of yourself as possible.”
~From Orange Fish by Carol Shields
Studying the various covers used for The Stone Diaries is interesting. My favorite one is the first image posted here; the copy I happen to own is the third example. These last two covers are the ones most readily available today. I kind of despise the black and white image of this woman though. It doesn’t seem to represent anything about the novel’s content. And, the pink copy with the image is even worse because the size of the book is larger and its pages have those fake hand-cut edges. After I decided I was going to work on this novel, my prof ordered a copy off of Amazon. I actually intended on giving him a copy. He seemed interested in the book and I happen to like giving friends copies of it. Any way I can get more people to read it…. Unfortunately, Amazon sent him the pink copy. The printing does insinuate some interesting things about how Penguin’s marking this book today and how much cultural capital is being investing in Shields’ most-excellent novel.
My prof responded with a tone of disappointment — “It’s very pink.”
I couldn’t contain my laughter and let out a *loud* cackle.
I know several book clubs around the nation have been reading this book. Clearly, Penguin’s playing up to this audience, forcing the novel to appeal primarily to a limited audience. (Keep your eye on Oprah’s Club). I’ve always hated that this is the way people tend to deal with Shields. Calling her a “woman’s author” or a woman who writes about and for women. I mean, yes, she wrote novels about women, but that doesn’t necessarily mean she wrote for women exclusively.
Feel free to vote on your favorite cover.
P.S. If you’re interested in Shields and are looking for *quality* scholarship on her work. Try this book: Narrative Hunger. It’s the best there is, and by that I mean — it’s pretty damn good.
*NOTE: This post is under construction. I’ve changed some of my ideas since I published this post. A new one will appear soon.*
I’ve been working on a paper discussing one of my favorite books of all time — The Stone Diaries by Carol Shields. There are lots of reasons why I love this book: it mixes genres, it represents what I think a lot of women’s lives must have been like during the early and middle parts of the twentieth century. Really, it probably is representative of some women’s lives still today. Aside from the connections to women’s literature and feminism, this is just a fantastic book. Very smart, witty, and cleverly crafted. If you haven’t read it yet — it’s a must for your reading list.
I think I first heard about Carol Shields and this particular novel during the summer after my freshman year of college. I first read Shields’s Orange Fish and to tell the truth — I wasn’t struck by it. I don’t even think I finished it. Then, I read Stone Diaries. Most of the complexities of the novel just whizzed by me until I read the novel again in an undergrad class on twentieth century lit. Between my obsession with Woolf in college, an introduction to Kundera’s Unbearable Lightness of Being, Morrison’s Song of Solomon (another one of my top faves), and a second reading of Shields I became hooked on twentieth century lit. I still didn’t really *get* The Stone Diaries until I taught it a my former institution for several years. It’s a little like Nights at the Circus; it demands several several readings, despite the fact that Shields’ work is vastly different, not to mention a lot less dense, than Carter’s.
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