Emily St. John Mandel

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Literary Arts

Emily St. John Mandel

Past Event: Wednesday, November 23, 2016

At Town Hall Seattle—The Great Hall

Co-Presented by The Seattle Times. Sponsored by KPLU 88.5 FM, KUOW 94.9 FM, and Seattle Met.

I’ve been thinking lately about immortality. What it means to be remembered, what I want to be remembered for, certain questions concerning memory and fame. I love watching old movies. I watch the faces of long-dead actors on the screen, and I think about how they’ll never truly die. I know that’s a cliché but it happens to be true. Not just the famous ones who everyone knows, the Clark Gables, the Ava Gardners, but the bit players, the maid carrying the tray, the butler, the cowboys in the bar, the third girl from the left in the nightclub. They’re all immortal to me. First we only want to be seen, but once we’re seen, that’s not enough anymore. After that, we want to be remembered.

— Emily St. John Mandel, Station Eleven

What matters is good writing, what matters is that there are people who love books enough to press them into your hands in far-off cities. We are here for the books, but I think it’s easy to get distracted by our longing for success and forget this.

— Emily St. John Mandel

Mandel is an able and exuberant story­teller, and many readers will be won over by her nimble interweaving of her characters’ lives and fates.

— Sigrid Nunez NY Times Sunday Book Review

Emily St. John Mandel is the author of four novels, most recently Station Eleven, which was a finalist for a National Book Award, the PEN/Faulkner Award, and the Arthur C. Clarke Award.

She was born and raised on the west coast of British Columbia, Canada, and studied contemporary dance at the School of Toronto Dance Theatre. She lived briefly in Montreal before relocating to New York.

A previous novel, The Singer’s Gun, was the 2014 winner of the Prix Mystere de la Critique in France. Her short fiction and essays have been anthologized in numerous collections, including Best American Mystery Stories 2013. She is a staff writer for The Millions. She lives in New York City with her husband.

 

Selected Works:

Novels
Station Eleven (2014) – Winner of the Arthur C. Clarke Award and The Morning News 2015 Tournament of Books, finalist for numerous awards including the National Book Award and the PEN/Faulkner Award, and long-listed for the Bailey’s Prize (formerly the Orange Prize) and the Andrew Carnegie Medal for Excellence in Fiction
The Lola Quartet (2012)
The Singer’s Gun (2009) – Winner of the Indie Bookseller’s Choice Award and was the #1 Indie Next Pick for May 2010
Last Night in Montreal (2009) – Finalist for Foreword Magazine’s Book of the Year, long-listed for The Morning News’ Tournament of Books and the Spinetingler Award, and Indie Next Pick for June 2009

Essays
“Susan Sontag, Essayist and So Much Else” – Humanities– (2014)
“I Await the Devil’s Friend Request: On Social Media and Mary Maclane” – The Millions-(2013)
“Susanna Moore, Cheryl Strayed, and the Place Where the Writers Work” – The Millions (2012)

Links

Emily St. John Mandel’s homepage
The Guardian: Arthur C Clarke award goes to ‘elegy for the hyper-globalised present’
Emily St. John Mandel reads from Station Eleven at 2014 NBA Finalists Reading
The Millions: Artifacts of the Present: The Millions Interviews Emily St. John Mandel
National Book Foundation: Interview With Emily St. John Mandel, 2014 National Book Award Finalist, Fiction
Humanities: Susan Sontag, Essayist and So Much Else

Event Details

Town Hall Seattle—The Great Hall

1119 8th Ave
Seattle, WA 98101

View directions.

Transportation & Parking

Town Hall Seattle is centrally located at 1119 8th Ave, on the corner of 8th and Seneca. Their venue is served by frequent bus routes, is near access to light rail stations, and close to a number of parking options nearby. Please see their website for more details.

Accessibility

Open Captioning is an option for people who have hearing losses, where a captioning screen displaying the words that are spoken or sung is placed on stage. To make a request for open captioning, please contact us at [email protected] or 206.621.2230×10. Please note: for in-person events at Town Hall Seattle, we appreciate a two-week advance notice to allow us time to secure captioning services. 

Closed Captioning is an option for people who have hearing loss, where captioning displays the words that are spoken or sung at the bottom of the video for online events. Captioning is available for all online events; click the “CC” button to view captions during the event.

Assistive Listening Devices (ALDs) are devices that people with hearing loss use in conjunction with their hearing device (hearing aids or cochlear implants). Town Hall Seattle has a hearing loop system, so you can switch your T-coil hearing aid to telecoil to have the stage’s microphones transmitted directly to your hearing aids. To pick up a headset, check in with any Town Hall usher when you arrive.

Sign Language Interpretation is available upon request for Deaf, DeafBlind, and hard of hearing individuals. To make a request for interpretation, please contact us at [email protected] or 206.621.2230×10, or select “Sign Language Interpretation” from the Accessibility section during your ticket checkout process and we will contact you to confirm details. Please note: we appreciate a two-week advance notice to allow us time to secure interpretation.

Wheelchair Accessible Seating and Accessible Restrooms are available in all sections at Town Hall Seattle, which is fully accessible to ticket holders with physical mobility concerns. Town Hall Seattle recommends that visitors use the 8th Avenue Entrance for events in the Great Hall, and elevators with Braille signage go to all levels within the Hall. The venue has all-gender, ADA-accessible restrooms on the lobby and Forum level. To reserve seating for a specific mobility concern, please contact us at [email protected] or 206.621.2230×10, or select “Wheelchair Accessible or Alternative Seating Options” during ticket checkout, and we will contact you to confirm details. For more details on accessibility features at Town Hall, click here.

Guide and service dogs are welcome.

All-gender restrooms are available.

We are pleased to offer these accessibility services at our venues, and they are provided at no additional cost to ticket holders. Please contact us with any questions and feedback about how we can be more accessible and inclusive. Our Patron Services Manager is available at [email protected], or Monday-Friday from 10:00am – 5:00pm at 206.621.2230×10.

For more accessibility information, please head to lectures.org/accessibility. If you would like to make accessibility arrangements you do not see listed here, please contact our box office or select “Other Accommodations” from the Accessibility section during your ticket checkout process, and we will contact you to confirm details.

Seating Chart