Alice Munro Pulls a Philip Roth

In a piece published in the National Post yesterday, Alice Munro—hours after winning the Trillium Book Award for her short story collection Dear Life—told a reporter that she was “probably not going to write anymore.” “Not that I didn’t love writing,” she added, “but I think you do get to a stage where you sort of think about your life in a different way. And perhaps, when you’re my age, you don’t wish to be alone as much as a writer has to be.” It was hardly a conclusive retirement—more like an affectionately weary expression of the quiet torments of the writing life—but still the National Post ran the headline “Alice Munro announces retirement from writing” and the report spread quickly online. And this wasn’t the first time Munro had declared an intention to quit: she made a similar vow several years ago in an essay for PEN Canada. Both times the literary world reliably pounced.