Anne Michaels examines how history is inextricable from the story of our inner lives

“Hold a book in your hand and you’re a pilgrim at the gates of a new city.”

That’s a line from Anne Michaels’ bestselling debut novel, Fugitive Pieces, which came out in 1996. The acclaimed Canadian poet and novelist has a way of taking her readers on a journey to new worlds, introducing them to characters who try to answer some of life’s most difficult questions.

Though Michaels is a prolific writer, she only puts out a novel about once every 13 or 14 years. After Fugitive Pieces came The Winter Vault in 2009, and now she’s back with her long-awaited third novel, Held, which spans 115 years and deals with themes familiar to her work: history, grief and the power of love.

“The narrative dips in and out of various places and times, and in many ways is trying to express all the ways that love continues its work past the span of a single life,” Michaels tells Q‘s Tom Power about the book.

“We’re used to thinking about history as actions and events, but it’s also the story of our inner lives, the force of our inner lives, what we believe in, what we aspire to, what our values are. And I wanted to really bring us to present moments in relationship to history that have to do with the power of that inner life.”

Rather than examining history as a series of events, Michaels explores how the details of our lives are connected to and exist alongside larger historical events.

“Every present conflict has its origins in the past,” she tells Power. “When do you begin to count the dead? From where do you begin to count the dead?

“This book tries to examine the forces from evolution, particle physics, revolution, hauntings, hope, a gesture and air of silence, desire, compassion, memory, the way we choose, and all the ways beyond our choosing, all the ways we’re connected to each other and through time. So it’s examining, also, the way in which our most personal domestic life is connected to those larger historic events. Because those events enter into our lives, they enter into how we sleep, where we sleep, what we eat, what we think. You know, it’s inextricable.”

The full interview with Anne Michaels is available on our podcast, Q with Tom Power. She also talks about how she knows a book is finished, and why she chooses to live an intensely private life. Listen and subscribe wherever you get your podcasts.

Interview with Anne Michaels produced by Cora Nijhawan.