"Neo-rural" they are called in French-speaking Quebec, Canada, she says. Lise Tremblay, 69, is the oldest of them and now also lives in a cabin in the forest.
There's a lake there, there are birds and bears, it's very isolated.
After 30 years as a literary studies teacher in Montreal, she moved back to the place where her family had a simple cabin when she was growing up. She had a new, well-insulated one built.
I think a writer always starts from childhood, it's inevitable. When you open your eyes to the world, you are impregnated by it. In Montreal I always said that I was an immigrant from the countryside.
Short of words
Her language is as barren and laconic as her award-winning literary works are sparse: eight books, six of which have been translated into Swedish. They have received excellent reviews, and her visit to the Book Fair is followed by literary talks in Nyköping, Stockholm, Malmö and Lund.
I work hard, but I also really enjoy it.
Growing up in a working-class family has also given her an irrational fear of running out of money, she says. Even as a pensioner, she calms herself down by teaching a little remotely.
Writing has always been something she did first and foremost for herself, to be able to think and understand the world.
After her debut at the age of 30 in Montreal, she was filled with her own importance, now not at all.
It's normal to be like that at 30, but I think aging is interesting in literature. The view of life and the world is broadened, and being a writer is a profession where getting older is an advantage.
In Swedish, “Judith’s Sister” was published earlier this year, a teenage story not unlike the author’s own upbringing. Her latest book, however, is “Driftens väg,” a collection of short stories about older women who are abandoned by their husbands or who leave them.
They are forced to deal with loneliness, and for some it is unbearable. I wanted people to see that these women are not stupid, that they can see clearly. Older women are not always listened to, but I think they have something important to say to the younger ones.
A good marriage is not everything.
Dropped everything
Right now she's not writing at all. When her little sister was diagnosed with incurable uterine cancer, Lise Tremblay dropped everything - even writing - to be by her sister's side for the last two years.
It slowed down my writing, but it's not dangerous. If it comes back, I'll write a book, otherwise not.
Born: 1957 in Chicoutimi, Quebec, Canada.
Lives: Outside Saint-Fulgence, Quebec, Canada.
Language: French.
Books in Swedish: "The Heron" (2015), "The House on St. Paul's Road" (2017), "Saguenay" (2019), "Animals" (2021), "The Road of Drift" (2024) and "Judith's Sister" (2026).
