The Biblio File hosted by Nigel Beale

Laura Claridge has written books ranging from feminist theory to biography and popular culture, most recently the story of an American icon, Emily Post: Daughter of the Gilded Age, Mistress of American Manners, for which she received a National Endowment for the Humanities grant. This project also received the J. Anthony Lukas Prize for a Work in Progress, administered by the Nieman Foundation for Journalism at Harvard and the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism. Born in Clearwater, Florida, Laura received her Ph.D. in British Romanticism and Literary Theory from the University of Maryland in 1986. She taught in the English departments at Converse and Wofford colleges in Spartanburg, SC, and was a tenured professor of English at the U.S. Naval Academy in Annapolis until 1997. Laura's biography of iconic publisher Blanche Knopf, The Lady with the Borzoi, was published by Farrar, Straus and Giroux in April, 2016. We met a her home in New York’s Hudson Valley to discuss Blanche's role as publisher, and wife to Alfred Knopf.

Barabara Slate is "an artist, cartoonist, graphic novelist, comic book creator, and writer. She is one of the few female artists who has created, written, and drawn comics for both DC and Marvel Comics." In 1986 Barbara created 'Angel Love' for DC Comics, an adult-themed series for teenagers. In an exhibition review, The New York Times described her art as "emphatically of our time with its narrative of passion, gun violence, and female assertiveness."  Her textbook, You Can Do a Graphic Novel, was first published in 2010 by Penguin. Barbara recently updated it, so I took the opportunity to interview her at her home in the Hudson Valley (one that she shares with her famed husband, book binder Richard Minsky). Among other things we talk about Barbara's latest work, The Mueller Report Graphic Novel, about stick figures, personal creativity, artistic style, creating compelling characters; about page layout, writer's block, and breaking into the biz, plus loads of other useful advice on how to write/draw/create a successful graphic novel. And then there's a visit from Sparky the dog. 

James Daunt is the founder of the Daunt Books chain, and since May 2011 has been managing director of the bookshop chain Waterstones.  In June 2019, he became the CEO of the US bookstore chain Barnes & Noble, acquired by Waterstones's parent, Elliott Advisors for $683m. We met last year in London to discuss Waterstones's impressive turn-around. We met last week in a small room (with apologies for the  loud-ish air ventilation system) in the basement of the Union Square branch of Barnes & Noble in New York to talk about what's next for Barnes & Noble (The green room was occupied by Malcolm Gladwell who was delivering a talk at the store that evening). 

Leslie Hurtig was born into a house of books and has had a long, successful career in Canada’s book industry. She has worked for some of Canada’s best bookstores, acted as a sales representative and publicist for some of North America’s great publishers, and worked as a foreign rights and contracts manager at Raincoast Books. Leslie sat on the Board of Directors for the Vancouver Writers Fest before taking on her "dream job" position as Artistic Director.  Jan Walter has spent her life around books: selling, editing, publishing, promoting. She began as a bookseller at Mel Hurtig’s store in Edmonton, eventually running her own – Fifth Business Books. She has worked as an editor and in executive positions with several Canadian publishing companies. In 1988, with Gary Ross and John Macfarlane, she started Macfarlane, Walter & Ross, which became Canada’s premier publisher of quality non-fiction, publishing titles including Boom, Bust & Echo by David Foot, The Danger Tree by David Macfarlane, and On the Take by Stevie Cameron  Jan has been involved in publishing education at institutions across Canada, teaching at Simon Fraser and Ryerson Universities. She moved to Kingston, Ontario in 2004. A few years later, teaming with Merilyn Simonds, she helped  professionalize the Kingston WritersFest. I met with Leslie and Jan in Kingston to talk about Mel Hurtig and his legacy as bookseller, publisher and patriot. 

Bruce Fye  is an American retired cardiologist, medical historian, writer, bibliophile and philanthropist. He is emeritus professor of medicine and the history of medicine at the Mayo Clinic, and was the founding director of the institution’s W. Bruce Fye Center for the History of Medicine, named by the Clinic in his honour as a result of his philanthropy. In addition to building up a large collection of books, offprints, and autographs relating to the history of cardiology, and to Sir William Osler during his lifetime, Fye has been a collector of prints and engravings relating to medicine and the portraits of physicians. In 2016, he donated many of his books to the Mayo Clinic. We met in Montreal, during an American Olser Society meeting, to discuss book collecting and Bruce's life as a book collector. 

Christopher Lyons, is the head librarian of rare books and special collections at McGill University's McLennan Library. He was formerly in charge of McGill’s Osler Library which holds the collection of it’s founder, Sir William Osler (1849–1919). A major figure in modern medical history, Osler is "well known as a scientific researcher, a great medical pedagogue, a humanist, and an advocate for a patient-centered approach to medicine." "Born in Ontario and educated at McGill University...where he taught from 1874 until 1884 before leaving to join the faculty at the University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia, and then to become one of the “Big Four” founders of Johns Hopkins Hospital and medical school in Baltimore...he finished his career as Regius Professor of Medicine at Oxford University, where he was also able to devote time to his passion for book collecting."  Chris and I met at his offices in Montreal to talk about Osler the medical book collector. 

Ambassador Bruce Heyman is an American businessman and served as United States Ambassador to Canada under Barack Obama from 2014 until 2017. He appears regularly on CBC, Fox Business, Bloomberg, CTV, CNBC, and other media outlets as an expert on trade and bilateral issues. Bruce lives in Chicago with his wife and co-author Vicki Heyman who was an American cultural envoy in Canada, leading cross-border conversations and programs related to the arts, social innovation and youth engagement. She is on the board of the Council for Canadian American Relations, Chicago Media Project, and the international advisory board of C2 Montreal. Vicki lives in Chicago where she and Bruce are co-founders of Uncharted LLC.  We met in Montreal to discuss their new book The Art of Diplomacy: Strengthening the Canada-U.S. Relationship in Times of Uncertainty.  Among other things we talk about marriages, Justin Trudeau, Donald Trump, the arts, beehives, political books, indigenous culture; who has friendlier waitresses - the U.S. or Canada?; the Keystone pipeline, Tim Bits, and Goldman Sachs. 

Bob Rae is senior counsel with the law firm Olthuis, Kleer Townshend and teaches public policy and governance at the University of Toronto. He was the Member of Parliament for Toronto Centre and was the interim leader of the Liberal Party of Canada from 2011 to 2013. He was previously leader of the Ontario New Democratic Party and the 21st Premier of Ontario, from 1990 until 1995. Between 1978 and 2013, he was elected 11 times to federal and provincial parliaments. Mr. Rae is currently Canada's special envoy to Myanmar. He has written five books, the most recent of which, What's Happened to Politics? was published in 2015, just prior to that year's Canadian federal election. We talked about the book and this year's election when we met at his offices on University Avenue in Toronto. Among other things we discuss lessons he's learned during his time in politics, how scripted and stage managed politicians are today, the undermining of parliamentary procedure, constant campaigning, partisan spin replacing meaningful policy, centralization of power in the PMO, broken promises, the rule of law, and the need for more political engagement on the part of the general public. The book serves as a blueprint for how the next Prime Minister should lead, and what policies he or she should consider introducing. 

Ricardo Cayuela is a writer, essayist, and founding editor of Letras Libres ("The New Yorker of Mexico"). In 2013 he was appointed Director General of Publications by the Mexican government. Today he is the president of Random House-Mondadori-Alfaguara and Editorial Director of Penguin Random House México.  We met at the Blue Met Literary Festival in Montreal to talk about, among other things, Mexico's efforts to promote reading and books; bookstores in Mexico City, fine press books; violence against journalists; his book The Mexico that Hurts, Octavio Paz, and Malcolm Lowry. 

Jody Wilson-Raybould, also known by her initials JWR and by her Kwak’wala name Puglaas, is a Canadian politician and the Independent Member of Parliament for the riding of Vancouver Granville. She served as Minister of Justice and Attorney General in the cabinet of Justin Trudeau from 2015 until January 2019 and then as Minister of Veterans Affairs of Canada from January 14, 2019, until resigning on February 12, 2019. Before entering federal politics, she was a provincial Crown Prosecutor in Vancouver, a Treaty Commissioner and Regional Chief of the B.C. Assembly of First Nations. Wilson-Raybould studied at the University of Victoria and later at the University of British Columbia. She lives with her husband Tim Raybould in Vancouver.  We met in Ottawa the day after her book From Where I Stand, Rebuilding Indigenous Nations for a Stronger Canada was launched and talked, among other things, about telling the truth in politics - the whole truth; about exactly what 'title' means; about launching a book in the middle of an election; about keeping promises, Justin Trudeau and SNC Lavalin, Alberto Manguel, Conrad Black, the Royal Proclamation of 1763, Confederation, assimilation, the Charter of Rights, the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous People, reconciliation, indigenous self government, community development, revenue sharing, spousal travel, and creating a more 'just society'.