small things: (a random selection of anti-essays) (70)

by Sky Gilbert

small things is a book of mini-anti-essays, part of Sky Gilbert's project to dismantle and challenge the rigid classifications of genre. The purpose of this kind of genre bending is to challenge 21st century notions of truth. Inspired by Oscar Wilde, Foucault, and the post-structuralist project, the small writings in small things are story, essay, and memoir combined. They challenge the notion that an essay is necessarily fact, or fair opinion, or even informed opinion, while at the same time challenging the notion that fiction might necessarily be free of didacticism, or at least, ideas.

170 pages, Mass Market Paperback

Published October 1, 2018

Reviews

[Jane Mulkewich · Rating 5 out of 5]

I loved this book; a small book of mostly short chapters with some pretty big ideas, or at least big for me because the author Sky Gilbert inhabits a different world from the one I live in (despite the fact that we both live in Hamilton, Ontario). He is quite right that "if you are not a theatre person, you don't know what a dramaturge is" but I learned all about dramaturges and more. I learned a lot about the author's perspective (being a gay man of a certain age) and his experiences during the AIDS epidemic for example, when he believed that AIDS was more linked with homophobia and fear of sex than science. He cited Peter Duesberg, a Nobel award-winning scientist who claimed the AIDS virus is a fiction because the virus had never been isolated in a test tube (the minimum requirement for a virus to be classed as bona fide infectious disease)... Duesberg's ideas about AIDS are now debunked; Gilbert writes about the impacts on his community in a very honest and raw way (and thought-provoking as I am reading now in the midst of the coronavirus pandemic). He starts the book with a little boy walking with his mother (and further explores the boy-mother theme throughout), and also writes about his father's depression, and lots of other things such as teaching a Seniors Shakespeare class at Hamilton Public Library. He writes revealing things about people I have heard of, like Nick Saul, or Bill Glassco (who founded the Tarragon Theatre in Toronto), or Jordan Tannahill. He writes "this is scary for me because I think Jordan will someday - perhaps even around the time this essay is published - be very powerful - in a 'world-class' way". This book was published in 2018, and in 2021 Tannahill's book "The Listeners" was a finalist for the Giller Prize, so I think Gilbert's prediction is coming true. He writes about so many things, including the time that Agatha Christie disappeared for 11 days in 1926. You might well wonder what it is that ties all the "small things" in this book together, and for that I can only offer these two quotes: "I am one who believes that at the heart of it all there is a mystery and not a truth". "Perhaps from looking at all the clues I will someday understand what the mystery is".