Talk of the Town

Pearls In Vinegar: The Pillow Book of Heather Mallick

Thu. Sep. 23, 7:30 - 9:00 pm

With: Heather Mallick, Globe & Mail columnist, and author of Pearls in Vinegar

There are few newspaper columnists writing in Canada today who provoke the kind of strong reactions Heather Mallick does. Her weekly column As If, in the Globe & Mail, prompts letters to the editor, postings on web sites and blogs and a torrent of emails to her personal mailbox. Her fans beatify her for her various miracles, her detractors vilify her for her sins and heresies. But in her new book, Mallick has avoided the temptation to take the easy route and produce a collection of her most popular or infamous columns, and turned instead to a form of writing first practiced by a Japanese lady-in-waiting, Sei Shonagon, more than a thousand years ago. Here is the modern publisher’s description of Sei Shonagon’s Pillow Book (so-called because it was kept in a drawer in a Japanese wooden pillow):

“Her book is a collection of anecdotes, memories of court and religious ceremonies, character sketches, lists of things the author enjoyed or loathed, places that interested her, diary entries, descriptions of nature, pilgrimages, conversations, poetry exchanges--indeed, almost everything that made up daily life for the upper classes in Japan during the Heian period. Her style is so eloquent, her observations so skillfully chosen, and her wit so sharp that even the smallest detail she records can attract and hold the attention of any modern reader.”

The challenge of matching that insightful observation, eloquence and wit to conjure with everyday life must have been what attracted Heather Mallick to the form. In 160 entries she ruminates on gardenias, snake balls, the weirdness of all workplaces, the quirks of German cannibalism, the advantages of obsessive-compulsive disorder and why the people you didn’t sleep with are more interesting than those with whom you did. In the introduction to the book she observes her parents and herself:

“ My father was an optimist. My mother was a pessimist, but a strong one. I, raised in the middle of millions of flat hectares of scrub Jack pine and uncountable massive quantities of dry white snow, am a pessimist through and through. And I am convinced that though I inherited my mother’s stoicism, I am a depressive by landscape. My worm-sized DNA is half mad and wild, half Calvinist by nature, but oh it is stark by nurture. Take this into account when you like my observations. I might be wrong, you see, I’m only a nematode after all.”

Join us for an encounter with the quick and quirky mind and wit of Heather Mallick at Talk of the Town.

The discussion will take place at UBC Robson Square. Attendance is free of charge, but please pre-register at info.talkofthetown@ubc.ca or phone 604-822-1700.

Excerpt From a Column

“Home is the place where they have to take you in, Robert Frost wrote. In the case of the American army deserters now arriving in Canada, home is the place where they want to give you a lethal injection. So all they're asking of Canada, their new home, is a bed in the spare room of a Quaker family, and all we ask of them is that they never complain they can't see the puck. That remark makes Canadians crazy… Peaceful young Americans coming to Canada, here's a tip: Put your children in French immersion. It'll pay off. Take classes in plumbing; a good plumber in this country can make a fortune, and no householder will begrudge it. This is also true of electricians and carpet cleaners; they are universally incompetent. I once had my carpets cleaned by a blind man who created a whole new set of stains. Then he put on his glasses - "Now I can see!" he said - and wrote out the bill. But I didn't call his boss to complain -- Canadians never do. I just bought scatter rugs.”

- From “The Rough Guide for Deserters” Globe & Mail, April 17 2004

Biography

HEATHER MALLICK, is a columnist for the Globe & Mail and has worked as well at the Toronto Star, the Financial Post, and the Toronto Sun. At the Sun, she won a National Newspaper Award for her first feature article in 1994. The judges of the 1995 awards had this to say about her second consecutive nomination: “Normally, one can sleep walk through a book review without doing damage to oneself or to the book being reviewed… Not so with the work of Heather Mallick. She writes with passion and verve on topics as diverse as Caribbean immigrants in Toronto, pretentious celebrity biographies or life of a small town stripper.”

Links & Readings

Links

Mallick on Taxes

This column describing her willingness to pay taxes and her appreciation for what they provide was published in the Globe & Mail in June 2004.

Mallick on Magazines

This column on magazines was published in the Globe & Mail in March 2004.

The Rough Guide for Deserters

In this column, Heather Mallick , with tongue in cheek perhaps, advises American deserters on how to feel comfortable in Canada (April 2004).

An Appreciation of Katherine Govier

In this 1995 piece from the Toronto Sun, she praises the work of Canadian writer Katherine Govier.

Column on Americans and letters in response

This column, entitled “Americans: Hate ‘em or hate ‘em” was published in 1999 and received a torrent of reaction.

Readings

The Pillow Book of Sei Shonagon, translated and edited by Ivan Morris, Columbia University Press, 1991

The Pillow Book of Eleanor Bron, An Actress Despairs, by Eleanor Bron, Jonathon Cape, 1985