Harper\'s Bazaar UK - 11.2019

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ment, and both struggle to come to terms with their situation.

Meanwhile, Noah is busy trying to discover whether his mother

was involved with the French Resistance – or was in fact working for

France’s Nazi occupiers and the Vichy regime that supported them.

The book has its origins in the two years Donoghue spent living

with her family in Nice. ‘I love places that are steeped in history,’ she

says. ‘Nice is surreal because it is so

pleasure-filled – you are basking in

sunshine, you are covered in icing

sugar as you eat a pastry – but you look

up and there’s a plaque commemo-

rating men who were hanged by the

Nazis on that very pillar.’ She began to

look into the history of the Resistance,

and was both fascinated and perturbed

by what she found. ‘In France, people

talk as if the movement was something

everyone took part in,’ she says. ‘But

there’s very little about how the Vichy

government collaborated with the

Germans. At one point, they were

offering the Nazis more Jews than they

had been asked for. One study said that

maybe two per cent of the population

had any involvement in the Resistance.’

The investigation of this bleak history is leavened by the comedy

and pathos of the growing – and unlikely – connection between

Noah and Michael. Interestingly, Michael began, for Donoghue,

purely as a literary device: something to put an obstacle in Noah’s

path. But, she says, real sentiment can come from the most technical

motives. ‘They can end up being emotionally the heart of the story

• cold-blooded decisions can lead to very warm-blooded moments.’
  The result is a delicate and moving reminder of the way in which our
  human stories are made from such practical choices – often in life
  as well as literature.
  ‘Akin’ by Emma Donoghue (£16.99, Picador) is published on 3 October.

160 | HARPER’S BAZAAR | November 2019 http://www.harpersbazaar.com/uk

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mma Donoghue is perhaps most famous for her 2010 novel

Room, written in the voice of five-year-old Jack, who is

being held captive along with his mother. Its blend of the

horrifying and the quotidian, showing how children seek

normality in any circumstances, made it a bestseller. Room was short-

listed for the Orange Prize and for the Man Booker Prize, and in 2015

adapted into a film starring Brie Larson.

But to focus on a single book is to

miss the range of Donoghue’s achieve-

ments. As she points out when we

speak on the phone – I’m in London,

England, and she’s in London, Ontario,

where she lives with her partner Chris

and their two children, Finn and Una

• she has been writing full-time since
  she was 19. Her first novel, Stir-Fry,
  set in contemporary Dublin, appeared
  in 1994, followed by Hood in 1995. In
  2000, Slammerkin – inspired by an 18th-
  century murder on the Welsh Borders


• saw her move into historical narra-
  tive, a genre at which she has become
  adept. Since then, there have been
  short stories, books for young readers,
  screenplays and scholarly titles (she
  has a PhD in literature from Cambridge University).
  Yet Donoghue laughs when I express wonder at the variety of
  her accomplishments. ‘I think it’s a kind of restlessness,’ she says. ‘If
  I were to set three novels in the same time and place, I’d get bored;
  my prose would flag. I’m stimulating my imagination, I suppose.’
  Her latest tale, Akin, is set in the present day but delves into the
  dark aftermath of World War II. Noah, a New York-based scientist
  on the cusp of his 80th birthday, is preparing to travel to the South
  of France, where he was born as the war was breaking out. Sent to
  America to escape the conflict as a child, he is now embarking on
  his first trip back to his birthplace. But just as he is about to set off,
  he finds himself made the temporary guardian of his 11-year-old

RELATIVE

VA L U E S

A retired professor and his

great-nephew uncover their

family’s wartime secrets in Emma

Donoghue’s latest novel

By ERICA WAGNER

Our Lady of Kibeho at

Theatre Royal Stratford East

Set in 1980s Rwanda, Katori Hall’s

powerful drama about a schoolgirl’s

premonition of a national tragedy

features live music performed by

a superb ensemble cast.

Until 2 November (www.stratfordeast.com).

[Blank] at the Donmar Warehouse

Written by Alice Birch and directed by Maria

Aberg, this heart-rending new play is composed

of 1 0 0 scenes that collectively interrogate the

impact of the criminal-justice system on women.

11 October to 30 November

(www.donmarwarehouse.com).

Unknown Rivers at Hampstead Theatre

The Nigerian-born playwright Chinonyerem

Odimba celebrates sisterhood in this

poignant depiction of a young woman

recovering from trauma with the help

of her female friends.

31 October to 7 December

(www.hampsteadtheatre.com). FH

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BOOKS