Margaret Atwood, the author of the blockbuster “The Handmaid’s Tale” and 49 other books of fiction and poetry, has a sprawling new memoir, “Book of Lives: A Memoir of Sorts.”
Here & Now‘s Robin Young sat down with her at the First Parish Church in Cambridge, Mass., next to the Old Burying Ground that inspired her as a student at the Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study. Atwood talks about her childhood in the woods of Canada, how the mean girls of 4th grade became the basis for her novel “Cat’s Eye,” and how she came to write “The Handmaid’s Tale,” among many other things.
By Margaret Atwood
Excerpted from “Book of Lives: A Memoir of Sorts” by Margaret Atwood, published by Doubleday, Penguin Random House, an imprint of PenguinPublishing Group, a division of Penguin Random House LLC. Copyright ©2025 by O. W. Toad Limited
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