Margaret Atwood on gender, women's rights, and Roald Dahl revisions - BBC News
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- Опубликовано: 16 мар 2023
- Booker prize winner Margaret Atwood describes herself as an "observer," but in her many novels she has often offered us a portal to understanding, be it about totalitarianism, or the idea of other forms of life, future and past.
In her latest book, Old Babes in the Woods, she navigates death and the loss of loved ones, in short stories which are both acerbic and hilarious, as well as adding to her fantastical oeuvre, such as an octopus-like creature narrating its own interpretation of a folk tale.
Seven of the stories feature the characters Tig and Nell, a thinly-veiled portrayal of Atwood and her long-life partner Graeme Gibson who died four years ago. Margaret Atwood began her interview with Kirsty Wark with a reading from the darkly funny story, Widows.
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“IF YOU DON’T LIKE THIS PAGE, TURN OVER AND READ SOMETHING ELSE” has to be the best quote to come out of a 12 century author, still relevant.
It’s a fallacy that somehow the older something is the less relevant it is. The problem with Chaucer today is not his ideas but his way of expressing them in Middle English. If ideas are good, they will always be relevant. Witness the fact that we still borrow heavily to this day from the Greeks and the Romans and they preceded Chaucer by at least a millennium!
@@titteryenot4524 god it nice to see there’s still intelligence and just normal conversation on the internet, have a great weekend.
@@VisagesSausages Lol.🤣👍
I think feminism means something different in USA than Europe, as in Europe it only means fighting abuse and subjugation of women. Such as women didn't have as many rights and were less represented in their own country. It wasn't until recently women had the right to not be raped by her husband. In USA it seems to be an insult by men who hate women, who spend their time searching out examples of idiots who talk nonsense to say all women who fight against abuse are like that. Funny how they spend too much time online whinging against women, filling comment sections no matter what the subject as an excuse to whine on against feminists and saying what women should want, but no woman finds an abusive misogynist who feels threatened by women who have rights against them to be a turn on.
I also think men and women dislike each other more in the USA than Europe, as USA women tell men they're disgusting if not cir'cised and some men who had that done develop issues, such as less sensitivity, which they spend a lot of time online trying to take out on women. Like the USA man who was banned from entering Europe for making web pages promoting men rpe and abuse women when travelling.
Although I also acknowledge men from many places who have had injunctions taken out on them by women offline, then use the internet to carry on being abusive.
Chaucer was a 14th century author, by the way.
If you are paying attention, she's displaying exactly why the US obsession with youth culture is all wrong. I'm in my mid 50s and am really enjoying getting older and not having to go through all the nonsense of youth anymore. I think she's trying to explain to people that at her age it's even better.
I was 64, working, fit, healthy, happy. Then I noticed 6 months after retiring my thinking wasn’t as sharp. My decisions weren’t so quick and decisive and within a week, I felt tired and I felt old and weary. This may not happen at 64, but when your body says stop and rest more times than it says get up and go, you know you’re getting old. It’s almost as if it happens overnight. 😢
@@mak7587 This same thing happened to my grandfather; he even went to the doctor (which he never did) and asked to be tested for Alzheimer's because he was afraid he was losing it. But then he found a sort of volunteer job and all of his symptoms went away and his health improved. Some people just aren't cut out for retirement; it's toxic to them. Some of us need a reason we find worthy to get out of bed in the morning. Find yours and I bet things improve.
I am 70 and she is so correct! Not worring about silly things like when we were younger is great. But you just often have to do things slower. See my comment below
Depends entirely of the speed of decline of body and mind. Another person at her age might have extensive health issues
@@monmothma3358 Way to be positive
Just when I thought I couldn’t love Margaret Atwood any more than I already do. She’s a wise, intelligent lady. There isn’t much she hasn’t seen in her life.
That says much about you - how stupid you are
Too bad she won't admit what a woman is
@@EB321 yes, neurotic, conflict avoiding, histrionic, hysterical, anxiety prone, emotionally incontinent, highly strung…all great things to elevate in society as we affirmatively action these whack jobs into the highest levels. Covid was female mass hysteria even. There is no doubt that standards have fallen as feminism has risen.
Russia and China get it.
@@EB321 Too bad you can’t admit what a woman is. Let alone that a woman can be born with the wrong genitals just like she can be born with a deformed foot. It’s also too bad that you can’t find anything better to do than to troll people over things that don’t affect you.
The love I have for Oryx and Crake . Thank you Margaret Atwood
Such a pleasure to hear an intelligent person speak her mind so eloquently.
Totally true, Brilliant
Beautiful words, but I don't have time for philosophers to let this work itself out. I am in one of the 22 self ID states. Men have fully taken advantage of the fact that they can be in our spaces and it is illegal for us to question their presence there. We now have to use the buddy system and be ready to defend ourselves because the law chose to abandoned all sex based protections. I really wish people would stop making handmaids tale jokes and wake the hell up before my neice gets raped in a public bathroom. Oh, and while we are on the topic, any woman reading this please go google the videos men are making in womens bathrooms to put online. This is a scam and we are the targets.
@@NiaLaLa_V You're right, it's not the job of philosophers to sort out politicians & the laws they make. Yet there is still an important rôle for people who can help others to see issues through a non-political lens, especially in a time when everything is so polarised.
We ALL have to do our part to bring awareness as you are doing now, regardless of who's rights are being stripped. The legislators in your states should be held to account by being challenged or voted out. In the meantime, I hope more people will recognise that you don't help one group by squashing down another.
@@NiaLaLa_V Since when did a 'rapist' need a women's restroom already?
Legend. Brilliant. Beautiful.
The wisdom of writers. They understand the importance of words, definitions, meanings, history, freedom of thought and creative expression.
Agreed. Those things you mention are their stock in trade, I’d say
She speaks with such clarity and sharpness. It's fantastic.
And common sense, which unfortunately isn’t too common these days.
I haven't watched Newsnight for 2 or 3 years but the Wonderful Margaret Atwood has tempted me back for a few brief minutes.
Same!
What a voice of wisdom and sanity 🙏🏻
Stunning interview, thank you
QUEEN! We don’t deserve her greatness.
On your first point I agree. On your second I say, we do and we need it too.
I just imagine George Orwell shrugging somewhere and saying, "See? I warned you."
Now there's another book that should be revised: 1984.
Add a transgender charachter and give it a happy ending.
@@inspectorpouzo Unironically something Gen Z would applaud.
@@_ArsNova Yeah so sad. I'm starting to think that this whole gen Z generation was a mistake. Isn't there a return policy or something?
@@inspectorpouzo Why? They weren’t the generation that lived on credit, spaffed the world’s resources and passed on the bill to grandchildren who’d never have their perks.
@@inspectorpouzo “1984”, like “The Testaments”, does have a happy ending if you read the afterword.
I would love to see a panel of women 70 y/o and over discussing issues of today with their knowledge of the past included. Margaret Atwood, Jane Fonda and Rita Moreno should be in that panel.
add Gloria Steinem ❤
Germaine greer 🙌
Sally Field
and Ru Paul!
@@PrimoStracciatella Ru Paul is a man
Margaret Atwood is great Observer , Everyone busy in their world and Less people observe .
Nooo, you are not too old! You are well seasoned the way all good things should be.
Thank you so much for your awesome creativity and insight.
A brilliant Canadian! Thank you for your voice, your talent, and your wisdom!
It is good to see that Margret does not claim holier than Thou. She did after all work with Playboy and Hugh Hefner...How does that fit into A Handmaid's Tale and her lack of concrete appreciation of women needing their own place, sports, and definition...Germaine Greer makes so much more sense. While she interviewed with Playboy, she did not pander to the men and write stories for them...I have dual U.S. and Canadian citizenship...The U.S. Puritanical background she speaks of, came from England.
and that English Puritanism made the USA what it was.
Or you might have been an unhappy French/Spanish region mired in internal conflict and constant revolution.
I love her books but she appears to be cowardly to me. And self interested. I’m baffled why everyone is so uncritical..
She kind of has a point. Of all the fuss put into the Roald Dahl book revision, it is odd that no one said let's write something new and befitting of our time.
If you want to indoctrinate you have to alter what exists already before you can write something new.
You might think I'm being melodramatic or a conspiracy theorist but I promise you people who engage in censorship have zero creativity of their own. Zeeeeroh.
Because the publisher knows his name sells so they want to ride on his wave but feel better about doing it. It’s all a farce.
2 words: Woke Culture
@@cryaboutit7499 exactly all they do is destroy
I think she specifically stated it was Disney-fication. I've been sayed for decades that Disney has warped the youth. Almost every single child from the 1990s through now were indoctrinated by Disney as their video babysitters.
It's so refreshing to hear a calm and rational voice. She spoke true words of wisdom.
she is a wretched hag.
Wow what a wonderful wise woman. Definitely going to look her novels up....❤
Pure class ❤
Thanks so much for posting.
Is the full-length version of this interview available to watch online?
She just full on avoided the question about sex based spaces
Because no matter how they respond they get attacked
I noticed that too.
“I knew early transgender people and there was no fuss.
Nobody was making this kind of fuss.”
Prior to the stealth implementation of gender self-identification, which destroyed all gatekeeping, there were no violent male rapists “identifying” into women’s prisons where vulnerable females are unable to “identify” their way to safety.
This is blatant sex discrimination is extremely unkind to women & it violates the Charter, the Constitution Act & international law.
@@heatheromeara5115 I sometimes wonder if she's trolling everyone and playing a bit of a game...being all over the place so she can make hints to things while simultaneously distancing herself enough. She says things are politicized and lack nuance...uh yeah, which group does she think has been doing that? They physically stop W from even talking about the implications among themselves, let alone any open discussions with multiple sides.
She tweeted not to long ago “Why can’t we say woman anymore?” And got attacked so I’m not surprised that she avoided the question
@@cryaboutit7499 She made reference to her age granting freedom, so I'm not sure.
thanks for this, has put a smile on my face
i will echo so many of the commenters; margaret atwood's wisdom and insights are fascinating to listen to.
Brilliant words from a wise woman. -- Love her!
So clever. So insightful. Amazing person!
Margaret Atwood is one of the greatest writers of all time. Handmaids Tale is brilliant. Very good interview.
I see everything! That's because I'm very old!
Gotta love her.
Brilliant as usual!
So incredibly quick and witty, I don't think anyone could 'pull the wool over her eyes!' So agree with her re: Roald Dahl, if you don't like it, don't read it!!! But leave it alone.......
So refreshing. I miss voices as this who used to be so widespread. Thank you, Margaret.
What a pleasure it is to listen to such an intelligent and witty person!
Wow what a great interview
Great interviewer and thoughtful discussion. How engaging.
Great writing
Read 'Alias Grace". Chills you to the bone as does Handmaid's Tale and rounds out that group story with an individual one signifying what she meant by 'the underlying pyramid' of a culture always emerges in cycles..
I so agree with this lady, thank you so much!!!
Margaret Atwood wrote the Handmaiden's Tale and yet believes in TWAW. It's the biggest irony.
What an intelligent, classy lady. Refreshing!
Such a boss. 👊🏻
Good sense of humor. Most times people grappling with big sociological and psychological issues lose it. Good to keep it.
'i see everything, i see everything, because i'm very old'.. so true. thats how i feel, i get all the sides, and some of them are plain nasty while others make more sense, but i still see whats going on i think. like people often get upset about things that arent really an issue
She’s a wonderful author
And sometimes people hide from what’s happening to others and do nothing.
That's because they push trans ideology in school. You're not born Who you are, you learn who you should become
She sees nothing...a anti-intellectual hack...supports Totalitarian feminism WOKE CULTISTS NOW desexing our kids
She's great 🙏
She’s a champ. I love this woman’s literary works and now I love her. What moxie. Intelligent, funny, straight forward, confident, bit of a curmudgeon, love it. That to me is what a strong woman looks like.
Exactly. She's doing more for women's rights and feminism than all those cheerleaders who are trying to force it on us.
@@PrimoStracciatella lol well said.
...with age comes wisdom, maybe not always, but most of the time.. I just love this woman of substance... she's setting the standards for others to follow.
"There was no fuss" I remember that too. Transgender people were just added to the long list of people with "official" grievances, and it went downhill from there.
Thank you Margaret for all you do.
My dog once pooped in front of her garden gate in Toronto. I was super nervous, cleaned up every speck but I was thinking the whole time "nooooo Bubba not hereeeee"
Brilliant. Loved the Mayan temple analogy. But is it true.
Much needed wise words from a wise woman!
😘A remarkable lady.
"You are a well-meaning busy-body, I don't fault you for it, you have a kind heart, you are filled to the brim with good intentions, but I don't want any casseroles or oblique probing questions or visits from professionals" - I love M. Atwood!
Loved that quote. Well meaning questions can be so tedious.
What a smart woman Margaret Atwood is - a pleasure to listen to her.
The Oracle - So amazing to see her, sooo sharp! she is a gift - I was blown away by"Handmaid" in college in the 80's, during Reagan and the rise of evangelical BS in the USA, it always made me wary of where the country was going - and look where we are now......
Soo boooring!
@@liveuser8527 Sharp argument. The exclamation point doubles your credibility.
@@liveuser8527 I see the adults have arrived…
@@markofsaltburn her views are extremely conventional (by todays woke standards)..yet.. simultaneously detached from reality
@@liveuser8527 I love your comment - full of insight . Priceless.
Class.
She is amazing.
The Disneyfication of fairy tales is correct. Not everything is, nor should be, squeaky clean and pleasant. I much prefer reality and darkness. If you don't like a book, you stop reading the book. You don't censor and alter it.
Love her
Mags was an absolute babe when I first saw her give a lecture in first year undergrad in 1971, and she's still a babe. The intervening 5 decades have not sapped her charm or wit, only added more mischief. Oh to be in the company of that giggle.
barf
brava :) ❤
If it could only be so .. that with age comes universal wisdom….
I love her SO!!
She’s right about transgender. I worked at a multinational oil company 25 years ago that had a male customer service representative trans to a woman. She was perfectly supported and accepted. The pronoun was “she” No problem.
That’s a man. Quit lying. I can be respectful without lying and using a ridiculous personal pronoun.
must not be paying attention
@JK Scout bless her heart, Atwood is right about everything but tr@ns. Like everyone else indoctrinated by bllionaires' propaganda, she believes the T-movement is an extension of the LGB movement, when in fact, it is escalating homophobia and certainly misogyny. As she says, she's too old to take up a new career, and standing against this new anti-woman movement requires assiduous research, in The Last 5 Years, on the odious sales technique for the fastest growing medical market in the world. Go search the market projection for SRS. Profits are way up. She's not a witch she just reads history as she said and she has not read the current events of the last half-decade or she would stand with the gendercritical movement
Could you please explain to me how a male person becomes a she? What is the math here?
@@perimele6 Don’t you know? They can simply declare themselves a different person. 😂😵💫
"It'll work itself out. I don't know how or by who, but it will." And that's part of why we're at where we're at and will stay there.
Apathy is our greatest enemy
Only if women get their rights back
Happens by magic.
Dumbest idea ever!
@@Dancestar1981 what rights?
Very smart and based lady. Much too good for the BBC!
Calm Brilliance .
'I read history' ......brilliant .
Edgy
"Sensitivity readers" = "'Ministry of Truth"!
Information retrieval
She seems quite unaware about what's going on. They are definitely not 'editors'.
a sensitivity reader is just someone who goes over the writing and makes comments. thats it. they dont even make edits and have no power over what gets published. please relax a little.
@@png8817 Wow! that's ballsy Mr/Ms png
It is Info Ret after all
and...
well,
you know
Information Retrieval,
I mean,
I'm relaxed technically but
AAAgggggh please...
no...
Christ nooooooo!!
AAhhhhhhhgg...
Know what I mean?
Just sayin'
amazing
We all need to understand the political, social, historical, cultural context of what we and others experience.
That takes time and effort.
From another ‘ageing’ feminist who studied Margaret as a student.
Thank you.
Yes....what happened to actual professional editors? That is a core question. Love Margaret Atwood, thank you!
Wet said as always Ms. Atwood
I've got a book club going with a buddy and I've never read The Handmaid's Tale, now it's next on the list. I loved Oryx and Crake many years ago. Also love Barbara Kingsolver.
Reported. In “it’s next” you’ve clearly hidden the word “sex”. Reported for obscenity.
Great book, and much better than the movie or TV show of course.
@@EugWanker Jeff will be reporting you for that name, m8. He’s the netcop who decides what people can or can’t see. If it offends him, he fascistically decides it’s due a ban. Just warning you.⚠️
@@titteryenot4524 Wait, that's not your alter ego? Also, reported for harassment.
@@JeffreyGoddin No it’s not my alter-ego and you *too* are reported for harassment.
Ms Atwood is a brilliant narrator, when you read her there is no way to know you are reading male/ or female writing or the age of the writer. Atwood is priceless.
I pray that Chaucer will be running for President in 2024. (US citizen here). Wonderful interview. Thank you.
What a genius.
Leading questions but Atwood doesn't fall for the bait.
I love this woman so much! 😍
What a great, wise woman
What did you expect she would say?
I love Maggie!
World's greatest living treasure
The part about Roald Dahl starts at about 7:30
Ask Margaret Atwood - What is a woman? Put her on the spot, eh?
POR FAVOR COLOQUEM LEGENDAS EM PORTUGUÊS 🇧🇷👏🇧🇷👏🇧🇷👏🇧🇷👏🇧🇷👏🇧🇷👏
She is a treasure. I am not prepared for the prospect of her dying. Yeah, I'll be able to re-read her books, but the thought that she'll be out of the world . . . There's no one else like her. (I'm still not over David Bowie being dead.)
Totally with you on Bowie 😢
She is remarkable. If you’re interested in female authors who predicted the times in which we now live. I highly recommend the works of Octavia E Butler. Most notably parable of the sower and parable of the talents, The second of which features a presidential candidate Who openly denies that he is promoting racism and inciting violence, while simultaneously doing it. His campaign slogan, make America great again. That was written in the 90s, fast forward to 2016. I’m still flabbergasted by that.
I can't recommend any book higher than Oryx and Crake. Love love love
LOL She is an ignorant anti-intellectual hack! Contradictory in thought just like the WOKE CULTISTS now Desexing our children!
Yes! I was thinking and feeling exactly the same thing watching the interview. I love her writing for its shifts between cool scrutiny and compassion. I was kinda thinking can she be of robust health for a couple more decades as her current self and add more layered insights to our lives.
Since I started using the internet I've been disturbed at what I've seen online for the promotion of abuse and hatred towards women. A lot of it seems to be from the USA.
I don't know if it's connected to them thinking they're the only country with free speech so should shoot their mouths off at each other for the sake of it, but men and women there seem to have more disturbing relationships than Europeans. In Europe the general culture is love and romance, and I think men and women in Europe have more healthy relationships.
There are various anti women USA groups. Such as men who make youtube videos saying they don't want women, but instead of doing what they say by going away and leaving women alone or to have hero gentlemen types, they spend a lot of time on the video comments trying to make women feel bad about themselves and promoting others abuse women.
Then there are those incels who are angry that women won't sleep with them. Not seeing the irony that women don't find a men a turn on who spend most of their time online swearing at women, and trying to make them feel bad.
Although it isn't all men against women. Lots of USA women say men are disgusting if they haven't been cir'cised. I sometimes wonder if doing that routinely on a national scale is why they have the most serial killers, as having a part of the body chopped off that's supposed to be covered until sx, so that it becomes hardened and less sensitive must affect some men psychologically.
Wow, great comment. I live in the US, and people don't even realize how misogynist it is. What you said about circumcision really hit home, too. Why?? Why is that done? My mother (who was a nurse) said it was for cleanliness back when I was a kid. Nonsense.
It is much deeper than that. There is a lot of misogynist content, it's true, but there is also a growing need to address lack of balance and the crisis of masculinity, and the lack of accountability on part of many women, feminism etc. And increasingly women are waking up to it too. Look up eg. Jedediah Bila's videos.
@@pwalk4160 I'm sorry, but this really comes off as mansplaining. And I've never heard of Jedediah Bila, and I'm not interested in looking up someone with such a biblical name. Christianity (and the other two Abrahamic religions) are huge contributors to the current crisis. You obliquely refer to accountability of women and feminism. Really. I wish people would look at their own damn selves and take accountability. Take care of their own gardens. This world would be a much better, safer place for everyone.
@@cecila2450boz Yes, it is certainly alarming when even white boys are struggling to thrive, and a small percentage of women in this world are surpassing white men in the bloated, dying patriarchy. I get that. In fact, my two sons are struggling in the fetid atmosphere we are all struggling in.
However, it is not women's fault, nor is it feminists' fault. Certainly, there are those feminists who hate men, but I believe they are in the minority. I do not hate men. I DO, however, hate patriarchy, and applaud its downfall. May it crumble and unseat those at the top who believe they are invulnerable.
May all beings on Earth be free from the scourge of patriarchy.
I wouldn't romanticize Europe. Germany and the Netherlands legalization of prostitution has recreated slavery. And some of the worst violence against women's marches that I've seen has come out of Spain and France. The problem is male violence. It exists everywhere in the world, to one extent or another, whether it has a romantic veneer or not.
Literally my exact thoughts on Roald Dahl. If I submitted something distasteful it would be rejected by publishers, so why does Roald Dahl get to have his work edited and resold. They are milking a dead man. If the work is so bad it needs changing, publish other authors instead.
4:45
I think she's wrong. It is not sorting itself out it's going to get worse. Some things come and go, other things are new. Her hubris is clouding her judgement.
no. short term thinking on your part. look at other rights -it's an ongoing tidal process with no guarantees. :)
💯
She didn’t say it would be fixed tomorrow. Overturning Roe was a 50 year endeavor and it might take us that long to get back, but we commit to reinstating our rights even if it isn’t fast or easy.
Side note: like her use of color with cheetah print. Love her ♡
Lionel Shriver says that women run publishing now, which explains the gender and Woke overreaction.
Great discussion covered many inspirational perceptions. Did alot for feminism ❤
My admiration for Ms. Atwood grows each time I hear her interviewed. This BBC interview I found particularly interesting. Although it dealt with the usual topical issues - "second wave" feminism, trans-gender phobia, and the Disney-fication of children's literature - Atwood's metaphor of the pyramid builders as emblematic of American Puritanism under-lying political and social upheavals was particularly striking.
Atwood's dispassionate view of the apparently limitless human capacity for self-defeating idiocy is something I find I share in my final years. It would behoove today's Gilead-loving Puritans to reflect on the fate of the Pyramid-building dynasts: all they left behind was impotent rubble covered by bombastic layers of equally impotent, now crumbling, rubble.
Whether it calls itself religion, tradition, conservatism, the "natural order", "Corporatism", or Neo-Fascism, the method is always Control; the means is instilling Fear; the justification is always the Will of some version of a Deity and the motive is the concentration of power in the hands of a "Leader" whose word is law.
The only question is: Can this trend toward monolithic, authoritarian, racist, misogynist tyranny be stopped?
That will be determined by humans who are ignorant of - or who refuse to learn from - past tyrannies or by humans who know that totalitarianism of any derivation is species suicide.
Agree. I'm seeing many control tactics and fear mongering. Heartening as well to read about so many protests...I didn't believe in Agenda 21 until I started sleuthing. Atwood presents the problem of Scientists playing God in Maddaddam & The Year of the Flood.
Maggs is looking fine, like finely aged wine. Cheers🥂!
A very wise woman!
I don’t understand the question, but I understood the answer ..
Margaret was way more than Kirsty could understand or navigate. C'mon BBC get someone with skills to interview a heavyweight.
I’ve watched countless interviews of Margret Atwood and she talks circles around all interviewers. Her interpretations of questions and perspectives in her answers are always unexpected, and always mind blowing!
This is why reading and History are so important, there are factions today that would obliterate them!
I love how she shut down the interviewer's attempt to show some sympathy for terfs