Montreal’s Sarah Bernstein explores power and prejudice in Booker longlisted ‘Study for Obedience’ – Montreal | 24CA News
When Sarah Bernstein began writing her second novel, “Study for Obedience,” the phrases of one other artist have been on her thoughts.
She had beforehand attended a retrospective of visible artist Paula Rego’s work in Edinburgh, Scotland and was struck by a selected quote emblazoned on the artwork gallery wall.
“She said something like, ‘I can turn the tables, I can do as I want, I can make my women obedient and murderous at the same time,”’ Bernstein recalled in an interview.
The Montreal-born writer mentioned that quote captured an “interesting tension” and supplied inspiration for the novel that has now been longlisted for this 12 months’s prestigious Booker Prize. The literary award acknowledges the most effective lengthy fiction work revealed within the U.Okay. and Ireland and written inEnglish.
Bernstein, who lives and teaches in Scotland, mentioned she was in “disbelief” when her editor informed her in regards to the Booker Prize nod.
“I can’t stress enough how inconceivable this was before I ended up on the list,” she mentioned.
“Study for Obedience,” first revealed by Granta Books within the U.Okay., explores the concepts of prejudice, energy dynamics and the way historical past shapes individuals. It’s scheduled for launch in Canada by Penguin Random House later this month.
It has been described as “unsettling” and one evaluation referred to as it a “masterly” followup to Bernstein’s 2021 debut novel, “The Coming Bad Days.”
In “Study for Obedience,” an unreliable narrator weaves the story of a younger girl who strikes to a distant nation of her ancestors to care for her brother after his spouse leaves him. The girl’s arrival is adopted by “a series of inexplicable events” and rising hostility from the area people, at the same time as she tries to do good.
Bernstein mentioned she wished to discover a personality who’s utilizing “typically feminized characteristics” that contain listening, obeying and taking good care of others, however may “take on a mysterious power over other people.”
Folded into which might be questions on how historical past is transmitted by means of generations and the way behaviours are realized both by means of specific instruction or easy statement, she mentioned.
Bernstein mentioned she nonetheless can’t absolutely take into account what the Booker Prize nod would possibly imply for her literary future. She imagines the popularity that comes with being within the working for the 50,000-pound (about $85,000) prize will make it simpler for her to publish a 3rd novel, which she was planning on doing anyway.
“You have to keep going and not really think about how people might respond to it,” she mentioned of her writing initiatives.
Earlier this 12 months, Bernstein’s title additionally appeared on literary journal Granta’s listing of greatest younger British novelists — a once-in-a-decade recognition of 20 writers below the age of 40.
Bernstein studied artistic writing and English at Concordia University in Montreal after which moved to New Brunswick to get a grasp’s diploma. She moved to Edinburgh in 2013 to work on her PhD, after which “just kind of stayed on in Scotland.”
She now lives within the Scottish Highlands and works as a literature and artistic writing lecturer on the University of Strathclyde, a job that enables her to steadiness educational work with fiction writing.
Since the publication of “Study for Obedience” and the Booker Prize nominee announcement, Bernstein mentioned she’s been making connections anew with writers in Montreal and the Maritimes and feeling like “it’s still possible to be a Canadian writer and not live there.”
Although she’s been setting down roots in Scotland, Bernstein mentioned she’s all the time hoped to return again to Canada sooner or later.
The winner of the Booker Prize is ready to be introduced Nov. 26, after the nominee listing is pared down to 6 finalists in September. Past nominees and winners embrace Alice Munro, Salman Rushdie, Margaret Atwood, Michael Ondatjee and Zadie Smith.
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