Fiction by Susan Swan has been
published in sixteen countries. What Casanova Told Me was published in
hardcover by Knopf Canada in 2004 and by Bloomsbury US in 2005.
Vintage Canada brought out a
paperback edition in June 2005.
Swan's sixth book fiction is a Mediterranean odyssey about the search
for renewal, pleasure and inspiration from the past, a story
that has as its counterpoint, the travelers of the eighteenth century
who sought truth and beauty in the ruins of Greece and Rome. The novel is
based on the journals of Asked For Adams, the fictitious cousin of
former American president John Adams who traveled with Casanova
during the last years of his life. It celebrates the unexpected in life and
travel as a form of love. Foreign rights have been sold to
Spain, Russia, and France.
Recent essays by Swan have appeared
(on Thomas Wolfe)The National Post June June 19, 2005, (on Casanova's
love secrets) MSN.com July 2005; on the literary blog site http://www.backstory.com. An essay titled The Education of a Novelist
will appear in the new PEN anthology due out next year. Swan's essay on
motherhood appeared in the new edition of Dropped Threads, Random House, Canada 2003.
Swan is currently teaching creative writing in York University's Division of Humanities.
Susan Swan's last novel, The Wives of Bath, (Knopf, U.S.), was listed in a recent U.S. reader's guide as one of the best novels of the nineties. A film based on this novel, Lost and Delirious, directed by Lea Pool with stars Piper Parebo, Mischa Barton and Jessica Pare, has been released in 32 countries (including Canada, Germany and the U.S.) and was featured as a Premiere Selection at the 2001 Sundance Film Festival and the Berlin International Film Festival. The novel, The Wives of Bath, was a finalist for the United Kingdom's Guardian Fiction Award and Ontario's Trillium Award.
A novel about a giantess who exhibited with P.T. Barnum, The Biggest Modern Woman of the World, was a finalist for Canada's Governor General's Award for Fiction and Smith's "Best First Novel" Award. It is currently being made into a film.
Stories in Stupid Boys Are Good to Relax With appeared in Granta and Ms. magazine.
Swan is an associate professor of Humanities at York University, Toronto, Canada. She was York’s Robarts’ Millennial Scholar for 1999-2000. She has
most recently given talks at Adelaide Literary Festival, Cheltenham Literary Festival, Stratford Celebrated Writers’ Series, University
of Milan and at the University of Athens.
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