Audience Questions for Giller Prize Event
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Background on The Sleeping Car Porter, winner of the 2022 Scotiabank Giller Prize Award
The Sleeping Car Porter brings to life an important part of Black history in North America, from the perspective of a queer man living in a culture that renders him invisible in two ways. Affecting, imaginative, and visceral enough that you’ll feel the rocking of the train, The Sleeping Car Porter is a stunning accomplishment.

Baxter’s name isn’t George. But it’s 1929, and Baxter is lucky enough, as a Black man, to have a job as a sleeping car porter on a train that crisscrosses the country. So when the passengers call him George, he has to just smile and nod and act invisible. What he really wants is to go to dentistry school, but he’ll have to save up a lot of nickel and dime tips to get there, so he puts up with “George.”

On this particular trip out west, the passengers are more unruly than usual, especially when the train is stalled for two extra days; their secrets start to leak out and blur with the sleep-deprivation hallucinations Baxter is having. When he finds a naughty postcard of two queer men, Baxter’s memories and longings are reawakened; keeping it puts his job in peril, but he can’t part with the postcard or his thoughts of Edwin Drew, Porter Instructor. Adapted from Coach House Books. 

Our guest of honour, Suzette Mayr, will be speaking and a member of our panel. Consider her background and what you might like to ask!
Some information on our panelists:

Dr. Steven Maynard: Steven is a Canadian social historian, specializing in the history of sexuality. His research, scholarly publications, and contributions to public and community-based history are animated by critical questions concerning the histories and politics of gender and sexuality. He also publishes in the areas of archival theory and Foucault studies. Steven’s teaching focuses on the pedagogical possibilities of "a history of the present." He is the founder and ongoing co-chair of the Canadian Committee on the History of Sexuality, an affiliate of the Canadian Historical Association, and book review editor of the Journal of the History of Sexuality. Steven has been active in the LGBTQ movement for many years and writes frequently on politics, culture, and history for the mainstream and queer community press.

Dr. Kristin Moriah: Dr. Moriah has taught undergraduate and graduate courses at CUNY, Grinnell College and Queen’s University. Their teaching and research focus on Her research interests include Sound Studies and black feminist performance, particularly the circulation of African American performance within the black diaspora and its influence on the formation of national identity. She is a Colored Conventions Project Teaching Partner. She is currently at work on a monograph entitled Dark Stars of the Evening: African Americans in Berlin, 1890-1945. Her research has been supported by fellowships from the Social Sciences and Research Council of Canada, the Rare Book School at the University of Virginia, and the Harry Ransom Center.

Dr. Chloé Savoie-Bernard: Chloé Savoie-Bernard is a writer, translator and editor. She has published several books since 2015, the latest of which is Sainte Chloé de l'amour (Hexagone, 2021). In particular, she directed the "Heroines" dossier for the journal Spirale (2021) and the Corps collective (Triptyque, 2018). She holds a doctorate in French-language literature (UdeM, 2020) and completed a postdoctoral fellowship (University of Sherbrooke, 2021).
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