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| Hilary Mantel | |
Tributes continued to pour in over the weekend for the beloved, award-winning author Hilary Mantel, who died September 22.
"The word 'genius' appeared often on Twitter, but 'generous' wasn't far behind," the Washington Post reported. "It was clear that Mantel left a lasting impression on not just readers but on journalists who interviewed her and authors who received her support. Hillary Kelly, for example, recalled the experience of losing an entire interview with Mantel to a 'faulty recorder,' only to have Mantel volunteer to have the whole conversation again. The novelist Stephen May was one of several writers who recalled Mantel getting in touch to offer encouragement about their work. 'She leaves a powerful legacy in her writing,' May wrote, 'but also she led an emblematic writer's life. Do the work, focus on that and help others when you can.' "
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| At Octavia Books, New Orleans, La. | |
In the Irish Times, author Anne Enright wrote: "An outsider reared in poverty, she would own, in prose, the central myth of Tudor England. 'By writing a novel one performs a revolutionary act.' Dame Hilary Mantel was wary of nationalism in all its forms. Britain 'can be used as a geographical term, but it has no definable cultural meaning' she wrote. 'As for calling me "an English writer"--it is simply what I am not.' "
"I am so very saddened to hear the news of the death of Dame Hilary Mantel," historical novelist Philippa Gregory posted on Facebook. "Her contribution to the literary world was outstanding and I, like many of you, hugely admired her work. We met several times--most notably for the (then) Duchess of Cornwall's book club, when we talked unstoppably about our approach to history and to fiction, the overlaps of the two disciplines, and our own rules of writing--until the camera crew insisted we stop! She was an enthusiastic historian and a gifted writer. Over the years we have both steadfastly refused to rise to bait of rivalry--instead we enjoyed a mutual respect and admiration for each other. I'm sorry our plans to meet again are delayed--she, of all people, would see death as little more than a delay to eternal planning! My thoughts are with her family."
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| At Innisfree Bookshop, Meredith, N.H. | |
The Guardian noted that "writers, journalists and editors said she was a joy to work with and supportive of other writers," including columnist and author Caitlin Moran, who said: "Hilary Mantel's mind was one of the most powerful and magic machines on Earth. We were lucky she wrote as much as she did, but holy hell, it's devastating that we've collectively lost something so astonishing."
Author Sam Knight tweeted: "Hilary Mantel was the only person who ever sent me an e-mail that left me in tears, when she liked my book. She was my favourite writer: the one I was most afraid of reading, because what was point, given her sentences, her soul and her mind. What a wonderful ghost she will be."
In a New Yorker magazine tribute, Larissa MacFarquhar observed: "If Britain were as grateful for her as it ought to be, there would be another funeral next week, as magnificent as the one for the Queen this week, though it would be attended by different people because Mantel could be rude about royalty. There are not many writers who, like prophets, seize, melt down, and reshape the archetypal stories of their people.
"The death of Mantel is not the same as the deaths of most people, because she has been there already. She spent much of her life in the past with the dead.... She pursued that line of inquiry all her life, and so I picture her now in the next world, meeting face to face at last the historical figures she mourned when they died in her books, asking them to tell her what actually happened at those crucial moments when the archival record failed her. She was always able to see into the next world, and told us what she saw there, but most of us cannot, so in losing her we have lost that channel. We can only reread her books, and say to people born in the future that we were alive at the time of Hilary Mantel."