Curated by: Anna Grigoryan
This week: The Woman. The Myth. The Legend: Susan Sontag! We attempt to unpack the persona of an exceptional American author, philosopher, playwright, and director, reconciling her life and work. Special shoutout to Nicholas Cage (seriously).
Books by Susan Sontag:
Illness as Metaphor/AIDS and Its Metaphors
Fascinating Fascism: Susan Sontag on Leni Riefenstahl (The New York Review of Books)
Books about Susan Sontag:
Sontag: Her Life and Work by Benjamin Moser
About the Host:
Novelist Randy Boyagoda is a professor of English at the University of Toronto and principal of St. Michael’s College, where he holds the Basilian Chair in Christianity, Arts, and Letters. He is the author of three novels: Original Prin, Beggar's Feast, and Governor of the Northern Province. His fiction has been nominated for the Scotiabank Giller Prize (2006) and IMPAC Dublin Literary Prize (2012), and named a New York Times Book Review Editor’s Choice Selection (2012 and 2019) and Globe and Mail Best Book (2018). He contributes essays, reviews, and opinions to publications including the New York Times, Wall Street Journal, First Things, Commonweal, Harper’s, Financial Times (UK), Guardian, New Statesman, Globe and Mail, and National Post, in addition to appearing frequently on CBC Radio. He served as President of PEN Canada from 2015-2017.
Music is by Yuka.
This podcast series is produced by Toronto Public Library, in collaboration with TIFA (Toronto International Festival of Authors) and Library and Archives Canada.
Books by Susan Sontag
Illness as Metaphor/AIDS and Its Metaphors
Books about Susan Sontag
Sontag: Her Life and Work by Benjamin Moser
Other Books or Materials Mentioned
Great Expectations by Charles Dickens
Film: David Lean’s 1946 version of Great Expectations (Criterion Collection)
The Master and Margarita by Mikhail Bulgakov
About the Host:
Novelist Randy Boyagoda is a professor of English at the University of Toronto and principal of St. Michael’s College, where he holds the Basilian Chair in Christianity, Arts, and Letters. He is the author of three novels: Original Prin, Beggar's Feast, and Governor of the Northern Province. His fiction has been nominated for the Scotiabank Giller Prize (2006) and IMPAC Dublin Literary Prize (2012), and named a New York Times Book Review Editor’s Choice Selection (2012 and 2019) and Globe and Mail Best Book (2018). He contributes essays, reviews, and opinions to publications including the New York Times, Wall Street Journal, First Things, Commonweal, Harper’s, Financial Times (UK), Guardian, New Statesman, Globe and Mail, and National Post, in addition to appearing frequently on CBC Radio. He served as President of PEN Canada from 2015-2017.
Music is by Yuka.
This podcast series is produced by Toronto Public Library, in collaboration with TIFA (Toronto International Festival of Authors) and Library and Archives Canada.
Writers Off the Page is a biweekly podcast series produced by Toronto Public Library that presents the best of 40 years from the archives of the Toronto International Festival of Authors (formerly known as IFOA: International Festival of Authors). Between 10-20 minutes long, episodes feature interviews, readings and discussions with some of the 20th century's best-known writers.
Works by Susan Sontag
“Godot Comes to Sarajevo” (New York Review of Books article)
Books about Susan Sontag
Swimming in a Sea of Death: a Son’s Memoir by David Rieff
Sempre Susan: a Memoir of Susan Sontag by Sigrid Nunez
Sontag: Her Life and Work by Benjamin Moser
Other Related Books or Materials
Waiting for Godot: Tragicomedy in Two Acts by Samuel Beckett
Ubu Roi: Drama in Five Acts by Alfred Jarry
Regarding Susan Sontag: a 2015 documentary
About the Host
Novelist Randy Boyagoda is a professor of English at the University of Toronto and principal of St. Michael’s College, where he holds the Basilian Chair in Christianity, Arts, and Letters. He is the author of three novels: Original Prin, Beggar's Feast, and Governor of the Northern Province. His fiction has been nominated for the Scotiabank Giller Prize (2006) and IMPAC Dublin Literary Prize (2012), and named a New York Times Book Review Editor’s Choice Selection (2012 and 2019) and Globe and Mail Best Book (2018). He contributes essays, reviews, and opinions to publications including the New York Times, Wall Street Journal, First Things, Commonweal, Harper’s, Financial Times (UK), Guardian, New Statesman, Globe and Mail, and National Post, in addition to appearing frequently on CBC Radio. He served as President of PEN Canada from 2015-2017.
Music is by Yuka
From the Archives
Writers Off the Page: 40 Years of TIFA is the first series associated with the Toronto Public Library’s multi-year digital initiative, From the Archives, which presents curated and digitized audio, video and other content from some of Canada’s biggest cultural institutions and organizations.
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Thanks to the Toronto International Festival of Authors (TIFA) for allowing TPL access to their archives to feature some of the best-known writers in the world from moments in the past. Thanks as well to Library and Archives Canada for generously allowing TPL access to these archives.
Works by Susan Sontag
Tuesday, and After: New Yorker Writers Respond to 9/11 (New Yorker article from Sep 2001)
Works about Susan Sontag
Sontag: Her Life and Work by Benjamin Moser
Robert Fulford: A Sojourn With Susan Sontag (National Post article from 2012)
Susan Sontag: The Complete Rolling Stone Interview
Susan Sontag: A Biography by Daniel Schreiber
Other Related Books or Materials
Theatre of War by Lewis Lapham
About the Host
Novelist Randy Boyagoda is a professor of English at the University of Toronto and principal of St. Michael’s College, where he holds the Basilian Chair in Christianity, Arts, and Letters. He is the author of three novels: Original Prin, Beggar's Feast, and Governor of the Northern Province. His fiction has been nominated for the Scotiabank Giller Prize (2006) and IMPAC Dublin Literary Prize (2012), and named a New York Times Book Review Editor’s Choice Selection (2012 and 2019) and Globe and Mail Best Book (2018). He contributes essays, reviews, and opinions to publications including the New York Times, Wall Street Journal, First Things, Commonweal, Harper’s, Financial Times (UK), Guardian, New Statesman, Globe and Mail, and National Post, in addition to appearing frequently on CBC Radio. He served as President of PEN Canada from 2015-2017.
Music is by Yuka
From the Archives
Writers Off the Page: 40 Years of TIFA is the first series associated with the Toronto Public Library’s multi-year digital initiative, From the Archives, which presents curated and digitized audio, video and other content from some of Canada’s biggest cultural institutions and organizations.
Thanks to the Toronto International Festival of Authors (TIFA) for allowing TPL access to their archives to feature some of the best-known writers in the world from moments in the past. Thanks as well to Library and Archives Canada for generously allowing TPL access to these archives.
