Sunday, May 31, 2015

Margaret Atwood submits manuscript to Future Library; won’t be read for 100 years

Author Margaret Atwood attends a ceremony with the Future Library near Oslo, Norway, on Tuesday, May 26, 2015. (Kristin von Hirsch/The Canadian Press)
Author Margaret Atwood attends a ceremony with the Future Library near Oslo, Norway, on Tuesday, May 26, 2015. (Kristin von Hirsch/The Canadian Press)

Victoria Ahearn - The Globe & Mail


Under a drizzling sky in a forest in Oslo on Tuesday, Canadian literary legend Margaret Atwood submitted an unread manuscript to a project that will keep the work under wraps for the next century.

The Toronto-based Man Booker Prize winner is the first author to hand over an unpublished piece to the Future Library in Oslo.

The international project will see one writer contribute a new, unread text to the collection every year for the next 100 years.

The pieces will be kept locked up until 2114, when 1,000 trees planted for the project in a forest just outside Oslo will be cut down to provide paper for their publication.

Anne Beate Hovind, the project director, said Atwood walked with a large crowd through the forest on Tuesday and handed over the manuscript in a simple ceremony amongst the newly planted trees.

The manuscript was sealed in a box, so no one could see how long it was, but Atwood did reveal its title: “Scribbler Moon.”

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