T H E S A L O N I N T E R V I E W | M A R G A R E T A T W O O D
![[Blood and laundry]](atwood970120.gif)
Margaret Atwood on famous Victorian murderesses,
her claim to Connecticut, and the deep
satisfaction of a clean, folded towel
T H E S A L O N I N T E R V I E W | M A R G A R E T A T W O O D
Margaret Atwood on famous Victorian murderesses,
her claim to Connecticut, and the deep
satisfaction of a clean, folded towel
an interview with Margaret Atwood is a bit like an audience with a duchess — a wickedly amused and amusing duchess. If the prolific Canadian novelist, poet and critic — perhaps best known for the 1984 novel "The Handmaid's Tale," made into a film in 1990 — was not born with her regal demeanor, she has certainly earned it by now, and her formidable talents only seem to be growing stronger. Her new book, "Alias Grace," is her first historical novel, based on a famous Torontonian maidservant, Grace Marks, who, in 1843, may or may not have participated in the murder of her employer and his housekeeper. It's a pointed, satirical view of Victorian society — from the bottom rung looking up, dirty underwear and all. Atwood's life-long penchant for misbehaving female characters takes a more mysterious turn with Grace, however; the servant's actual guilt remains maddeningly hard to pin down. In fact, trying to establish her role in the crime nearly drives Atwood's fictional psychologist, Dr. Simon Jordan, over the edge. Salon met up with Atwood during her recent visit to San Francisco, where she professed to be able to guess how many servants it took to maintain the city's various Victorian mansions, just by looking. You've written about Grace Marks before. Yes, a TV scenario, produced in 1974 by the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation, but it used only one version of the story, which was the only version that I knew at that time. That was [journalist] Susanna Moodie's rather theatrical and Dickensian write-up of the case. I was young and I thought non-fiction meant "true," and I believed her mostly. I didn't believe the part where she had Nancy being cut up into four pieces before being placed underneath the wash-tub, because I thought, "Why would they do that? Wouldn't it take a lot of time? And which four pieces? Why four and why do it at all?" So, that gave you a germ of suspicion. Somewhat. I didn't put the cutting up into four pieces into the television play.
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