Where the World Was by Rosemary Sullivan
CBC Books | Posted: August 21, 2023 7:10 AM | Last Updated: October 12, 2023
A writer's memoir of the travels and experiences that shaped her work
"As a poet and writer, [Rosemary Sullivan] knows that life is lived not as theory but as practice, that . . . you can understand nothing about a place without listening to individual people and their stories." — Margaret Atwood
Incomparable writer, activist, and world traveller Rosemary Sullivan has at long last written a book about herself, about her life quest to "meet the world, to celebrate its richness, to face its darkness."
And what a fascinating book it is! Comprised of 21 essays spanning 5 decades and multiple continents, Where the World Was offers a vivid portrait of a writer who is instinctively drawn to other cultures and places.
Whether writing about a solo vacation inside the Iron Curtain, meeting the reclusive writer Elizabeth Smart in a dilapidated cottage in the English countryside, reflecting on how Chilean society responded to Pinochet's coup, or tracking down the people who knew Svetlana Alliluyeva for Stalin's Daughter, Sullivan delivers a master class in cultural studies, human rights advocacy, and empathy for the human condition.
(From Goose Lane)
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Rosemary Sullivan is a poet and biographer. She created literary portraits of Elizabeth Smart, Gwendolyn MacEwen, Margaret Atwood and Joseph Stalin's daughter, Svetlana Alliluyeva. She was the 1995 recipient of the Governor General's Award for English-language nonfiction and the winner of the 2015 Hilary Weston Writers' Trust Prize for Nonfiction. In 2012, she was appointed an Officer of the Order of Canada.