ABOUT THIS EPISODE
In this episode, Globe and Mail journalist Marsha Lederman joins guest host Joshua Tapper to discuss her book, October 7th: Searching for the Humanitarian Middle, on the one-year anniversary of its publication in autumn 2025.
They explore the impulses—both personal and professional—that compelled Marsha to first write the newspaper columns she archives in the volume, as well as the provocative challenge the book's subtitle poses to Jews and non-Jews alike. Together, they unpack the many, complex afterlives of a book that not only captures the political and cultural mood in Canada after October 7 and the ensuing war in Gaza, but also offers a framework, for Jewish and non-Jewish Canadians, to confront and wrestle with the moment’s enormous psychological and emotional reverberations.
OUR GUEST
Marsha Lederman is a columnist for The Globe and Mail and the author of two award-winning books, Kiss the Red Stairs: The Holocaust, Once Removed, and October 7th: Searching for the Humanitarian Middle. From her base in Vancouver, British Columbia, she writes for The Globe about social justice issues, politics, feminism, the environment, arts and culture, family life, and the everyday.
RECOMMENDED READING
Marsha Lederman's website
Learn more about the book, October 7th: Searching for the Humanitarian Middle
Read Marsha's columns at The Globe and Mail, including "Are We on the Verge of an Exodus? In a Hate-Filled Climate, Canadian Jews are Weighing Their Options," October 3, 2026, which she discusses in the interview
EPISODE ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
Host: Jonathan Slater
Producer/Editor: Theadora Draper
Music: J.K. Bradley
Executive Producers: Joshua Tapper and David S. Koffman
Tête-à-tête: Conversations in Canadian Jewish Studies is made possible by the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada’s Aid to Scholarly Journals program and the Israel and Golda Koschitzky Centre for Jewish Studies and J. Richard Shiff Chair for the Study of Canadian Jewry, both at York University.