cover of episode From The New Yorker Radio Hour: Rachel Aviv on Alice Munro’s Family Secrets

From The New Yorker Radio Hour: Rachel Aviv on Alice Munro’s Family Secrets

2025/3/11
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David Remnick: Alice Munro作为一位诺贝尔文学奖得主，她的作品在文学界享有极高的声誉。然而，她的女儿Andrea Skinner揭露了Munro的伴侣Jerry Fremlin在她九岁时对她进行性侵的事实。这一事件让Munro的遗产蒙上了阴影，尤其是Munro在得知真相后选择继续与Fremlin生活在一起，牺牲了与女儿的关系。这一事件引发了关于艺术与道德之间的复杂关系的讨论。 Rachel Aviv: Alice Munro的作品不仅仅是关于人物内心生活的描述，她还通过作品探讨了沉默与被沉默的人、童年残酷与父母忽视等主题。Munro的作品跨越时间，展现了人物对过去的理解。然而，Munro的家庭秘密，尤其是她对女儿Andrea的性侵事件的沉默，让人质疑她是否为了艺术而牺牲了家庭。Munro的作品《Vandals》直接影射了Andrea的性侵经历，Munro通过写作来处理这一创伤，但她的女儿Andrea却感到被忽视和背叛。Munro的写作让人思考艺术的代价，尤其是当艺术建立在牺牲他人幸福的基础上时。

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Rachel Aviv discusses the shocking revelations about Alice Munro's family, where her daughter Andrea Skinner revealed that Munro's partner, Gerald Fremlin, had sexually abused her. This chapter delves into the family secrecy and Munro's controversial decision to stand by Fremlin.
  • Alice Munro was a Nobel Prize-winning short-story writer.
  • Andrea Skinner revealed her abuse by Gerald Fremlin, Munro's partner.
  • Munro chose to remain with Fremlin despite the abuse revelations.

Shownotes Transcript

Alice Munro, a winner of the Nobel Prize in Literature, was perhaps the most acclaimed short-story writer of our time. After her death, last year, her youngest daughter, Andrea Skinner, revealed that Munro’s partner, Gerald Fremlin, had sexually abused her starting when she was nine years old. The abuse was known in the family, but, even after Fremlin was convicted, Munro stood by him, at the expense of her relationship with her daughter. 

In this episode, the *New Yorker *staff writer Rachel Aviv joins the magazine’s editor, David Remnick, to talk about how and why a writer known for such astonishing powers of empathy could betray her own child, and how Munro touched on this family trauma in fiction. “Her writing makes you think about art at what expense,” Aviv tells Remnick. “That’s probably a question that is relevant for many artists, but Alice Munro makes it visible on the page. It felt so literal—like trading your daughter for art.”

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