Interview

The author of Proof of Heaven explains how a Near-Death Experience made him think differently about consciousness, and why science needs to shed its materialism for a more spiritual approach.

Ghalib Islam, author of Fire in the Unnameable Country, discusses growing up in Toronto’s Jane and Finch area, the “breathlessness” of his writing, and the resistance he faced when he decided not to venture into a more secure career.

The auteur behind Sexy Beast and Birth discusses his new film, Under the Skin, for which he would covertly film encounters between his star, Scarlett Johansson, and unwitting non-actors from the streets of Glasgow.

The Nigerian-born British author discusses her fifth novel, Boy, Snow, Bird, a reinterpretation of Snow White with an eye towards issues of race and beauty, and tells us what it's like “to mess up all the good fairy tales.”

The famed biographer of John Cheever and Richard Yates discusses the tenuous bond between him and his self-destructive brother, whose suicide provides the basis of his new memoir, The Splendid Things We Planned.

In Nancy Lee’s new novel The Age, young Gerry is driven to extremism by both standard teen angst and a generation-specific “nuclear anxiety.” We talk to Lee about the book, and growing up between the Vietnam War and the fall of the Berlin Wall.

The Russian-American journalist talks to Hazlitt about her new book, Words Will Break Cement: The Passion of Pussy Riot, and the perils of resistance in Vladimir Putin’s Russia.

The tragicomic novelist—now memoirist—talks about his father’s harrowing upbringing, the value of asthma, modern threats to reading culture, and what he really thinks of Canadian writers.

Paul Aikins was an actor; he ended up teaching high school music theatre. Now, with the national-champion choir he leads featured in a new documentary, an old student checks in with her teacher and former enemy.