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From the archives

The Grey Plateau

When the world stopped five years ago

One Brief Shining Moment

The world’s fair that put Canada (fleetingly) on the map

Lara El Mekaui

Lara El Mekaui edits at The New Quarterly and teaches at the University of Waterloo.

Articles by
Lara El Mekaui

While He Wrote

Martha Bátiz tells an untold story July | August 2025
Throughout his tumultuous literary career, Miguel de Cervantes was supported by his sisters, wife, niece, and daughter. They played pivotal roles in his life, yet little is known about the hidden figures behind the author of Don Quixote, whose idealistic and often delusional protagonist echoes his own fraught relationship with women. Martha Bátiz highlights the lives of these family members in A Daughter’s Place by picturing an untold aspect of the Spanish writer’s story: the experiences of those who…