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28-31 3/2/05 5:02 AM Page 31from a neighbour’s party, and he feelsguilty about smoking – a decidedly modern-dayphenomenon. Although theanachronisms are subtle, they’re enoughto make a careful reader realize that thestory takes place somewhere other than inhistorical reality. “It doesn’t take place inthe history of America, but in the historyof an attitude or a feeling,” Heti explains.Ticknor may not be historical fiction,but Heti used her subject as a startingpoint – literally. In writing the book,Heti often began by typing directlyfrom the real Ticknor’s own prose, usingthe beginnings of his sentences as fuel,and continuing on her own from there.Heti used a similar creative technique inwriting The Middle Stories, where shewould begin sentences without knowinghow they would end. It’s how shetalks, too. She starts down one path,stops, then starts again on another. Ifyou listen long enough, you can see howher ideas come into existence.IS EVERYONE INTERESTING? HETI SEEMSto believe it. In The Middle Stories, hercharacters were often generically identified– the plumber, the middleman, thepoet – but she infuses their lives with fantasticalevents. Similarly, in Ticknor, Hetidelves into the mind of a man who thinkshe is worthless, but in showing him attention,proves he’s not. Heti tested thenotion in real life by creating a venue for“average” people to speak publicly aboutthe things they really care about. Thatvenue is Trampoline Hall, a monthly lectureseries held in a variety of Torontobars, which Heti founded three yearsago with her friend Misha Glouberman.The people Heti asks to speak atTrampoline Hall are not really “experts”and often have never spoken in public.The lectures are not designed to inform oreducate, though Heti hopes they do communicatesomething “truthful.” And soTrampoline Hall audiences have listenedto impassioned speeches about the number32, why gossip is worse than pork,and how fantasy sports leagues allow mento be intimate without being personal.Heti would be the first to admit that thelectures are sometimes rough around theedges, but she says they are never boring.For Heti, who arranged the speakerseach month but has now handed responsibilityfor the whole enterprise to Glouberman,the series took on a social dimension.“I fall in love with people all thetime,” she says, “and Trampoline Hall wasa way of doing something with themrather than just going out for coffee.” Inhis memoir A Heartbreaking Work of StaggeringGenius, Dave Eggers describes alattice – a figurative snowshoe – whosecriss-crossing fibres are made up of theindividual connections among people.The lattice gains strength every time twopeople connect, and if the network growslarge enough, it can support anything.Trampoline Hall was Sheila Heti’s lattice.Now that her involvement with TrampolineHall has ended, it’s possible thatthe William Prescott phase of Heti’s life iscoming to a close, and the era of Ticknor– the reclusive writer – is beginning. “I’mquitting everything,” she says. “I don’twant anything that was in my life whileI was writing this book to be in my lifeanymore.” She says all her cultural activitiesfrom the last four years – TrampolineHall; her impassioned articles about artin the public sphere; the biweekly cocktailparties that she and her husband,Globe and Mail music columnist CarlWilson, held at their home in Toronto– share some indefinable quality that shewants to be done with now. She’s evenleaving the city, at least for a while, andshe doesn’t want to say where she’s goingnext. She wants to disappear. “I don’twant to know anybody,” she says.These days, people expect a lot fromHeti, who is left with no time to dowhat is most important to her – writebooks. Along with reading and just simplythinking about things, Heti says shewill have more time in her new city toindulge in her craft.When we’ve drained our mugs andput on our coats, I walk Heti to her nextappointment, which happens to be justaround the corner, at the place she discoveredTicknor. As she opens the door to goin, I realize that whoever awaits her therewill surely feel like the most extraordinaryand exciting person in the room. ■Micah Toub is a freelance writer in Toronto.IN THEUNIVERSITY OFWhyADVERTISETORONTO MAGAZINE?REACH CANADA’SBEST ANDBRIGHTEST MINDS• 220,000 Canadianprofessionals anddecision-makers• Plus 12,000 U.S. and 8,000international readers• Additional 14,000 elitedonors, corporations andpolitical figures onlyaccessible by advertisingin U of T MagazineCOST-EFFICIENTTARGET MARKETING• Median householdincome: $125,900*• Male: 48%. 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