Toronto-based author and poet Anne Michaels has won the $100,000 Giller Prize for her novel, Held, an emotional multigenerational story of love and loyalty that begins as a wounded soldier returns home from the First World War and follows one family across a century.
“Everything I write is a form of witness – against war, against indifference, against amnesia of every sort, ” she said in her acceptance speech on Nov. 18. “From when do we begin to count the dead? I’ve asked that question all my writing life. … Held says: in the places we feel most abandoned, we are not alone.”
In a November 2023 interview with Zoomer about the novel, the 66-year-old former Toronto poet laureate said the book explores how we long to keep memories alive of those lost on battlefields. “The need for what we can’t hold – can’t see – is overwhelming,” she said.
Michaels’ novel was chosen from a shortlist of five, which included Prairie Edge by Conor Kerr, Curiosity by Anne Fleming, Peacocks of Instagram by Deepa Rajagopalan and What I Know About You by Éric Chacour.
The jury – authors Kevin Chong and Noah Richler, as well as singer-songwriter Molly Johnson – described Held as “a novel that floats, a beguiling association of memories, projections, and haunted instances through which the very notion of our mortality, of our resilience and desires, is interrogated in passages as impactful as they can be hypnotic.”
Controversy dogged the Giller awards this year as numerous authors pulled their works from consideration to try to pressure the literary organization into dropping its lead sponsor, Scotiabank, which has a subsidiary with holdings in the Israeli military technology company Elbit Systems, an Israel Ministry of Defence contractor. Protesters held demonstrations in cities across Canada, including one across from the Park Hyatt Toronto, where the event was held.
After last year’s ceremony was interrupted by pro-Palestinian activists, this year’s event was filmed hours before it aired on CBC and CBC Gem. The bank’s name was removed from the prize ‘s title in September, and executive director Elana Rabinovitch has previously said she supports the authors’ right to protest, but questioned their target.
“If the issue is with Scotiabank’s investments, then perhaps the more effective path would be to go to Scotiabank,” she told Toronto Life in November, noting the Giller Prize is a nonprofit, not an advocacy or political organization. “We are a literary foundation that celebrates excellence in Canadian fiction, and now I’m being asked by many writers to change that and to make the awards into something that they’re not. I think what I find disturbing about the protests is that there’s a kind of authoritarianism about it, an insistence on making statements and picking sides.”
The prize was established in 1994 by her late father, philanthropist Jack Rabinovitch, to honour his wife, literary journalist Doris Giller, who died of cancer the previous year. Both were children of Jewish immigrants who settled in Montreal.
Previous winners are a who’s who of Canadian literature; the first four winners were M.G. Vassanji for The Book of Secrets, Rohinton Mistry for A Fine Balance, Margaret Atwood for Alias Grace and Mordecai Richler for Barney’s Version. Michaels was shortlisted for the Giller twice before: In 1996, for her debut novel Fugitive Pieces, and in 2009 for The Winter Vault. Held was also shortlisted for the Booker Prize, which went to British author Samantha Harvey for Orbital on Nov. 14.
The event was co-hosted by Ian Williams, who won the 2019 Giller for Reproduction, writer and lawyer Mark Sakamoto, journalist Johanna Schneller and singer Measha Brueggergosman-Lee.
