Alice Munro, a Canadian author who was revered worldwide as master of the short story and who won the Nobel Prize for Literature, died on May 13, 2024 at the age of 92. The prolific author leaves behind a strong literary legacy — along with many Canadian authors who were inspired by her and her work.
Below are some comments collected by CBC Books from just a few Canadian authors who shared their thoughts on the passing of Alice Munro.
Heather O’Neill
Heather O’Neill is novelist, short story writer and essayist based in Montreal. Her debut novel Lullabies for Little Criminals won Canada Reads 2007 and was a Giller Prize finalist. She was the first back-to-back finalist for the Scotiabank Giller Prize for The Girl Who Was Saturday Night in 2014 and her short story collection Daydreams of Angels in 2015.
Her novel The Lonely Hearts Hotel won the Paragraphe Hugh MacLennan Prize for Fiction and was longlisted for Canada Reads 2021. When We Lost Our Heads is her most recent novel. O’Neill championed The Future on Canada Reads 2024, becoming the first person to win as both a writer and a contender.
“Alice Munro has affected me profoundly at so many different stages in life. Her characters come across to everyone around them as women who will follow the rules. And then they don’t.
“They run away from those who try to fit them into the mould of what a woman should be. Munro always sees women as independent of their roles as mothers or daughters or wives.
Alice Munro has affected me profoundly at so many different stages in life.– Heather O’Neill
“They are wild creatures who pack their suitcases, button up their cardigans and sneak out of houses in the middle of the night to discover the world. And, oh they make a wonderful mess of it. But when Alice Munro shows us a woman making a decision to undo her life, these are truly incandescent and some of the most beautifully staged scenes in the history of literature.”
Kevin Chong
Kevin Chong is a Vancouver-based writer and associate professor at the University of British Columbia Okanagan. His books include the nonfiction book Northern Dancer and fiction titles like The Plague and Beauty Plus Pity. His latest book, The Double Life of Benson Yu, was a finalist for the 2023 Scotiabank Giller Prize. Chong, along with Suzette Mayr and Ashley Audrain made up the jury for the 2024 CBC Short Story Prize.
“I don’t write short stories — not that many, at least — because of Alice Munro. Reading her work, I know that I am not good enough, not patient enough, not aware enough. I appreciate the greater margin of error in novel-writing.
I have no doubt her books will still be read and cherished for generations to come.– Kevin Chong
“But what I’ve taken from her fiction is how ‘every short story is at least two stories,’ the way events in a character’s present-day situation can bring to surface a story from the past. I’m thinking of the satisfying ironies of The Bear Came Over the Mountain, where the main character, Grant, a philander in his past, sees his wife, who is suffering from dementia, fall in love with another man in a care home.
“I have no doubt her books will still be read and cherished for generations to come.”
Carleigh Baker
Carleigh Baker is a writer and teacher of Cree, Métis and Icelandic heritage. Her debut short story collection, Bad Endings won the City of Vancouver Book Award and was a finalist for the Rogers Writers’ Trust Fiction Prize and the Emerging Indigenous Voices Award. She previously taught creative writing at Simon Fraser University. Her latest book is the story collection Last Woman, published in 2024.
“I’ll never understand why the literati believes that novels are the pinnacle of sophisticated expression, but in spite of this, Alice Munro kept writing short stories.
I will miss her, but how lucky we are to have her voice!– Carleigh Baker
“And if that wasn’t enough to make her a hero in my mind, they are gorgeous stories, understated at the surface but churning with emotion in their depths. She saw people and places so clearly. She gave us a body of work that entertains, teaches, and endures.
“My favourite collection is Hateship, Friendship, Courtship, Loveship, Marriage. I read those stories over and over to help me remember how to be a person in the world. I will miss her, but how lucky we are to have her voice!”
Andrew Pyper
Andrew Pyper is the Toronto author of novels including Lost Girls, which won the Arthur Ellis Award for best first novel in 2000, The Demonologist, The Only Child and The Homecoming. His forthcoming novel William, written under the pseudonym of Mason Coile will be released in fall 2024.
“I was born and raised in Alice Munro Country. That’s not how the people in my hometown of Stratford, Ont., ever referred to it, but when I first encountered Munro’s stories as a teenager, I saw instantly that she was inhabiting the same place where I grew up. By ‘place’ I don’t mean the literal landscape of bean fields and unsidewalked towns and red brick Victorians and roads that petered out after a few dusty miles, but a location defined by things unseen as much as the observable.
When I first encountered Munro’s stories as a teenager, I saw instantly that she was inhabiting the same place where I grew up.– Andrew Pyper
“Houses dark but for a single light from a second-floor bedroom, unattended children whispering together in weed-ridden yards, single men sitting on rooming house porches looking out at passersby with longing, or nostalgia, or menace. I recognized my town (and the ones on the cross-hatched roads around it) in reading Alice Munro more profoundly than in any photograph or history or map.
“As a young person entertaining his first daydreams of being a writer, I was astonished not only by how she conjured this magic, but the way she did it while standing on the same unremarkable ground I stood on.”
Deepa Rajagopalan
Ontario-based author Deepa Rajagopalan was the 2021 RBC/PEN Canada New Voices Award winner. Born to Indian parents in Saudi Arabia, she has lived across India, the US, and Canada. Her previous writing has appeared in publications such as the Bristol Short Story Prize Anthology, the New Quarterly, Room and Arc. Her debut story collection, Peacocks of Instagram, was published in 2024.
“I just heard about Alice Munro. It’s the end of an era. I was recently a guest in the podcast, Bookspo by Kerry Clare, which is based on books that inspired your writing. I had picked an Alice Munro story, Corrie, as my inspiration for a story Rahel in my collection. I had mentioned that studying Alice Munro’s work carefully is equivalent to getting an MFA degree. She’s inspired me to think deeply about perspective, time and subversion in short stories.
It’s the end of an era.– Deepa Rajagopalan
“It is hard to pick a favourite, but I think the story Dimensions from her collection Too Much Happiness is probably one of my favourites. The emotional devastation is so profound in this story because of the plainness of the telling. I remember listening to an interview where Munro talked about removing all the flowery language during the editing process. I try to think about this when I’m editing. How to keep the prose as plain and precise as possible so the reader does all the feeling.”
Chanel M. Sutherland
Chanel M. Sutherland is a writer and product marketing director living in Montreal. She was born in St. Vincent and the Grenadines and moved to Canada when she was 10 years old. She holds a BA in English literature from Concordia University. She is currently working on a collection of interconnected short stories that explore the complex relationships and experiences of life in a small Caribbean village.
Sutherland is a two-time CBC Literary Prize winner. She first won the 2021 CBC Nonfiction Prize for her essay, Umbrella. Then in 2022, she won the CBC Short Story Prize for her story Beneath the Softness of Snow.
“Throughout all the ages of my life, I’ve found myself drawn to Alice Munro’s storytelling. Like many writers of short stories, I’ve felt her influence deeply. The Moons of Jupiter is a story I return to time and again, highlighting Munro’s lasting impact on my literary journey.
Her legacy remains an enduring testament to the power of storytelling.– Chanel M. Sutherland
“What initially captivated me was Munro’s knack for illuminating the ordinary, infusing the mundane with layers of meaning and significance. Her narratives overflowed with empathy and nuance, and as I immersed myself in her work throughout my life, I found solace and inspiration in her words.
“While Munro may have departed, her legacy remains an enduring testament to the power of storytelling. Her passing serves as a poignant reminder that though individuals may leave this world, their words and art endure, shaping the very essence of human experience and that which connects us.”
Susan Doherty
Montreal-based author Susan Doherty has worked at Maclean’s Magazine, the International Herald Tribune and ran her own advertising production company for 20 years. She published her debut novel, A Secret Music, in 2015. Research for her novel led her to the Douglas Hospital where she volunteered with people suffering from extreme psychosis. Doherty’s book The Ghost Garden is the culmination of her work in the excavation of mental illness; her most recent novel, Monday Rent Boy, was published in 2024.
“After feasting on Austen and Dickens, Alice Munro was the first author who taught me to capture the subtleties of the human condition with simplicity and precision. Her insights remain etched in my memory.
Her insights remain etched in my memory.– Susan Doherty
“As she wrote in The Beggar Maid: ‘People are always giving themselves away in small, unconscious ways.’”