In the early 1900s, the residents of Malaga Island off the coast of Maine were forcibly evicted by the State, and some were sent to the Maine School for the Feeble Minded.
Paul Harding’s novel, This Other Eden, is a fictionalization of this island and it interracial inhabitants, descendents of a former slave and his Irish wife.
I spoke with Paul Harding about how artifacts like photographs set off his imagination, some of the history behind the eugenics movement, and how he aims to write books that are meant to be reread
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This Other Eden was published by Norton.
Marginalia was produced at KMUW Wichita and is part of the NPR Podcast Network.
- Mark Statzer and Torin Andersen - engineers
- Haley Crowson & Lu Anne Stephens - editor
- Haley Crowson & Katie Lanning - producer
- Karlee Cooper - marketing coordinator
- Beth Golay - host
