Nothing at All by Olivia Tapiero, translated by Kit Schluter

A slippery sort of work – is it non-fiction? Is it poetry? And how is it being told? Are these disjointed at all, or are they more closely related than first appears? Nothing at All, Olivia Tapiero’s collection of vignettes exploring loss, illness, desire, and pain was translated from French by Kit Schluter for this edition. Translation of a work (not that I’ve done it, I’ve just sought out work in the past that translators have done about the act of translation) is always so interesting, because how the translator relates and interprets the text influences how the reader ends up experiencing the text. This is not always something I think about while reading a text, but I did ponder it during Nothing at All. The choice of words in this work is so central to how I experienced Tapiero’s explorations.

Most of the vignettes and poems in Nothing at All deal with what Tapiero and Schluter call “the hole.” And after reading this, while the thing that kept being described as a hole, while I would describe it as a void, that empty feeling inside, I understood the shock, the jar that use of “hole” was meant to evoke. Tapiero is explicit about her body, and the conditions of the female body under colonialism. From Algeria to France to Canada, Tapiero explores her body and the body of her ancestors through the feeling of the hole.

The choice of words in this work is so central to how I experienced Tapiero’s explorations.

Looking at colonialism and the way it’s written on her own body and history, Tapiero strings the crimes of the past with the crimes of the present, and the emptiness of late-stage capitalism. I wouldn’t call Nothing at All a bleak book, despite the fact that there’s very little to cheer a reader, other than some really beautiful writing and reflections. But it felt very true to the current moment (As I write this, I can see the headlines on the taskbar of my computer, reminding me of the escalation of war in western Asia) and to struggle with knowing the world, knowing your past, and dealing with the betrayals of your present. I read this as a linear work, but I don’t think it’s truly meant to be one – I think you could pick this up, read one of Tapiero’s vignettes, and still come away with something to carry you through the darkness.

I feel like I barely scratched the surface of what Tapiero is exploring in Nothing at All. It’s a slim 144 pages, and I found it very easy to read, but I think it’s a work that requires revisiting at different times and emotions, and also to play with how you read it, just as it plays with form and genre. A truly interesting work.

I wouldn’t call Nothing at All a bleak book, despite the fact that there’s very little to cheer a reader, other than some really beautiful writing and reflections. But it felt very true to the current moment.

Olivia Tapiero is a writer, translator and musician. Her published works include Les murs (2009, Robert-Cliche Prize laureate), Espaces (2012), Chairs (2019), Phototaxie / Phototaxis (2017/2021, Lambda Literary Awards Finalist), Rien du tout / Nothing at All (2021/2025, Governor General’s Literary Prize Finalist, Grand Prix du livre de Montréal Finalist) and Un carré de poussière (2025, Spirale Eva-le-Grand Prize laureate). She has translated works by Anne Boyer, Roxane Gay, Billy-Ray Belcourt and Eli Tareq El-Bechelany Lynch. She regularly collaborates with choreographer and composer Charlie Khalil Prince. She lives in Marseille.

Publisher: Strange Light (March 17, 2026)
Paperback 8″ x 6″ | 144 pages
ISBN: 9780771036286

Alison Manley

Website

Alison Manley has ricocheted between New Brunswick and Nova Scotia for most of her life. Now in Halifax, Nova Scotia, she is the Cataloguing and Metadata Librarian at Saint Mary's University. Her past life includes a long stint as a hospital librarian on the banks of the mighty Miramichi River. She has an honours BA in political science and English from St. Francis Xavier University, and a Master of Library and Information Studies from Dalhousie University. While she's adamant that her love of reading has nothing to do with her work, her ability to consume large amounts of information very quickly sure is helpful. She is often identified by her very red lipstick, and lives with her partner Brett and cat, Toasted Marshmallow.