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Steven Galloway (born July 13, 1975) "The Cellist Of Sarajevo". Sydney Morning Herald, Andrew Riemer, reviewer, February 22, 2008 is a Canadian novelist and a former professor at the University of British Columbia. He is the author of the award-winning novel The Cellist of Sarajevo (2008).
In 2013 Galloway became a tenured associate professor at UBC, and served as acting chair of the creative writing program. In 2014 he published his fourth novel, The Confabulist. In 2015 he was confirmed in the position of chair. "Under a cloud: How UBC's Steven Galloway affair has haunted a campus and changed lives". The Globe and MailNov. 21, 2016 Marsha Lederman
In November 2016, a large group of Canadian authors, including Margaret Atwood and Yann Martel, signed an open letter, written by Joseph Boyden, criticizing UBC for carrying out its investigation in secret and denying Galloway the right to due process. Some of the authors, including Miriam Toews and Wayne Johnston, later withdrew their names and support. The letter caused controversy in the Canadian literary community, with some accusing the signatories of taking Galloway's side over that of his accusers.
In December 2016, Galloway revealed that he had had an affair with a student, for which he apologized. According to Galloway's lawyer Dan Burnett, Madame Justice Boyd conducted an exhaustive review of the whole of the evidence and found on a balance of probabilities that Galloway had not committed sexual assault; Boyd also dismissed several other allegations of misconduct against Galloway including all of the allegations brought by additional complainants. "Author Steve Galloway apologizes in first statement since being fired by UBC". Toronto Star, Laura Kane of The Canadian Press. Nov. 23, 2016 page A16. In 2018, UBC was forced to pay Galloway $167,000 for violating his privacy rights and damaging his reputation. On July 13, 2018, Galloway published an essay in the Toronto National Post asserting that he was "not a monster," despite what he felt had been a coordinated campaign to paint him as such, and revealed that the woman who had accused him of assault was the one with whom he had had the affair. Steenkamp told a local newspaper the same day, however, that the dismissal was "fully justified" and that the sexual allegations against Galloway were not the only issues the university had considered. This comment was ruled to be a breach of the confidentiality agreement, which forbade public comments on the reasons for Galloway's dismissal.
In October 2018, Galloway filed a defamation lawsuit against the woman who accused him of sexual assault, along with 20 others who had spread the allegations on Twitter and within UBC, in the Supreme Court of British Columbia. The defendants contended that this was an example of a strategic lawsuit against public participation. Before deciding whether to dismiss the suit, the BC Supreme Court ordered Galloway's accuser to make a series of documents available in discovery. This ruling, which the Supreme Court of Canada declined to review, was upheld by a panel consisting of Chief Justice Robert Bauman and two other judges in April 2020. The disclosure revealed that the accuser (referred to in court documents as A.B.) had copied a Fifth Estate reporter in her initial complaint to UBC president Martha Piper, contradicting some of her previous testimony. Exchanges with reporters led A.B. to write in a subsequent email that was at her insistence read out to all UBC Creative Writing Program Faculty that "the CBC legal team thought my evidence was damning." She referred to this claim as an exaggeration following a statement by CBC that no such vetting had taken place. This assertion of "vetting" was the underpinning of a threat to sue UBC and the Creative Writing Program if they did not acquiesce to her demand to take action against Galloway. As reported in the Globe and Mail, A.B. said:
A nine day hearing on the lawsuit began in April 2021. During the proceedings, one of A.B.'s friends argued that her tweets about Galloway were inconsequential and that she had already suffered career setbacks by criticizing him. Galloway described how the allegations against him had destroyed his life and career, specifically mentioning the fact that his publisher withdrew a three book contract in 2018, and how he had been reduced to doing manual labor jobs, including cleaning swimming pools, for a living. He also took issue with a critic's review of a 2018 art exhibit, featuring art by A.B., which described the alleged assault without naming Galloway. It was revealed that two defendants, UBC Professors Keith Maillard and Annabel Lyon, had organized the meeting which first alerted other department members to the allegations — a meeting which one attendee described as "an protect students and faculty" and another described as "a toxic, traumatic event". Maillard and Lyon, who were on A.B.'s committee, rejected claims that their handling of the allegations was related to the fact that they had approved her application to graduate without a complete thesis.
On December 2, 2021, Justice Elaine Adair ruled that Galloway's suit was not a Strategic Lawsuit Against Public Participation"
Adair Ruling: Galloway v. A.B.,2021 BCSC 2344 Paragraph 539
Writing about this hearing in the National Post, Adam Zivo summarized Adair's ruling:
Adair's decision was appealed, and a hearing took place in May 2023 in the BC Court of Appeals. In January 2024, a three judge panel on the appeals court unanimously upheld Justice Adair's ruling and allowed Galloway's suit to proceed further to trial.
The defendants subsequently appealed to the Supreme Court of Canada in one last attempt to have the case dismissed. However, in October 2024, the Supreme Court refused to hear the case and rejected all appeals, with Galloway being awarded costs. This means that the defendants now have no more avenue of appeal and that the case will go to trial. A trial date has not yet been set.
The novel is set during the siege of Sarajevo in the mid-1990s and explores the dilemmas of ordinary people caught in the crisis. The title references the true story of Vedran Smailović, a cellist who played Albinoni's Adagio "dressed in evening tails and perching on a fire-scorched chair" every day for 22 days, "always at the same location", to "honour the 22 people killed by a mortar bomb while they queued for bread at 10 in the morning on May 26, 1992". The novel follows the lives of three fictional citizens of Sarajevo as they struggle to survive the war, including one who seeks to protect the cellist: "He has said he will do this for twenty-two days. This is the eighth. People see him. The world has seen him. We cannot allow him to be killed." The novel examines the gentleness found in humanity and the lasting and healing power of art.
Vedran Smailović did not learn of the book until after it had been published. Galloway had been advised to contact Smajlović, who had purposefully embraced a quiet, private life in Warrenpoint, Northern Ireland, but did not do so. When Smailović learned of the publication, he expressed feelings of indignation and dismay, objecting to the use of his story and his personal information without permission or compensation, and pointing out differences between the story and his actual life. However, a meeting between the two took place in 2012, moving a step closer to conflict resolution.
Galloway, claimed that Smailović's playing of the cello as a protest was a public act, and that fiction writers were under no obligation to pay those who inspired them, and that it was unreasonable to expect them to do so. Galloway insisted that the cellist in his story, while inspired by the photos and story of Smailović, was imaginary. Galloway sent the cellist a signed copy of the book.
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