Mona Awad with Margaret Atwood: Bunny

[@davelewis8270]

I'm not usually a fan of writers writing about writers but bunny is easily the best book I've read this year.

[@mspratyushasen]

28:00 Atwood: Does anyone fail at an MFA program? Awad: I'm sure that they do. I've never come across anyone that has. Such a Bunny-esque response. Hahaha!!

[@jamesp7588]

So true!!! Haha

[@ShannonsChannel]

Interesting discussion of this novel.Margaret Atwood pointed out things I hadn't picked up on at all reading this.

[@simongonzalez7500]

“Bunny” is one of my favorite books ever, it’s simply amazing

[@HerMajestyTheRatQueen]

ive been a fan of margaret since i was 13 and that was decades ago. she is a beacon for women. i recently fell in love with monas writing and she has become one of my favorites, what a pleasant surprise to see them speaking together. both beautifully talented women.

[@airbluedome]

Margaret Atwood’s ‘brief history of blondes in books’ was the highlight of this interview!

[@AuroraSummers]

2 or so years late, but I absolutely have to know … Did Margaret watch Heathers?

[@elizabethhall3674]

Hi, I was born with a cleft lip and palate. I also read Bunny, and I was so disgusted. How she describes the male bunnies is exactly how people born with clefts have been described throughout time. "Harelip" is an incredibly deratogory term for someone with a cleft, and that slur is one of the basic premises of the book. People born with clefts have traditionally been painted as less than human -- almost human, except for their "distorted" mouths which it what lets you know that they are not really human, and are instead deformed, animal-like monsters. People with clefts were also classically described as being developmentally disabled, and unable to have complex thoughts. All of this was used as reasons to commit infanticide against those with clefts -- much like the male bunnies are carelessly slaughtered in the book. The fact that Mona Awad so carelessly takes these stereotypes and uses them in her "hip, romantic gothic story", shows that she has clearly not wrestled at all with how these descriptions have been used to hurt and degrade people throughout time. I think many people would be completely disgusted by a book with the premise that "black people are monkeys" or "jews are rats", but because they are ignorant to the slur that those with clefts are "mindless harelips", they adore this book and miss how it perpetuates a degrading depiction. People born with clefts are human, they are not monsters or animals, and they deserve to live just as much as anyone else. I understand that many people are ignorant to how hurtful this book is, but please take the time to research the history of discrimination against those who are born differently, and reexamine this book through that light.