Wisdom in Nonsense: Invaluable Lessons from My Father (CLC Kreisel Lecture Series)

I broke all the rules that my dad gave me.

It was he who had given me, in part, the confidence to think of my life as being worthy to mix with those of the geniuses. ―Heather O’Neill

With generosity and wry humour, novelist Heather O’Neill recalls several key lessons she learned in childhood from her father: memories and stories about how crime does pay, why one should never keep a diary, and that it is good to beware of clowns, among other things. Her father and his eccentric friends―ex-bank robbers and homeless men―taught her that everything she did was important, a belief that she has carried through her life. O’Neill’s intimate recollections make Wisdom in Nonsense the perfect companion to her widely praised debut novel, Lullabies for Little Criminals (HarperCollins). Introduction by Kit Dobson.

Heather O’Neill is a novelist, short story writer, and essayist. Her work, which includes Lullabies for Little Criminals, The Girl Who Was Saturday Night, Daydreams of Angels, and The Lonely Hearts Hotel, has been shortlisted for the Governor General’s Award for Fiction, The Orange Prize for Fiction, and the Scotiabank Giller Prize, and has won CBC Canada Reads, The Paragraphe Hugh MacLennan Prize for Fiction, and the Danuta Gleed Literary Award. She lives in Montreal.