7 nuggets of wisdom from Margaret Atwood, the writers' writer

Only Margaret Atwood can weave continuity into a conversation that spans from dystopia to Donald Trump with unmatched effortlessness, peppering it with her wit and deadpan humour.

The refreshing session with the Booker prize-winning writer saw her discuss her life and works, including her latest novel The Heart Goes Last. The author spoke about notions of high and low culture, changing literary and political landscapes in Canada, the feminist movement and the ability of dystopian narratives to cause discomfort.

Mentioning superheroes with existential dilemmas, conversationalist dragons and a veritably "zombified" Canadian government of Stephen Harper, Atwood's beautifully quirky conversation was the ideal intellectual caffeine on the second day of the Jaipur Literature Festival.

Here are seven golden takeaways from the festival session with Atwood, truly one of the greatest living literary minds:

1. On historical and dystopian fiction

"We find historical fiction comforting because we already know how it turned out."

In a comparison, the writer claimed that while fictionalised history offers reassurance in a story whose conclusion is known, dystopia provides a blueprint for an uncertain future, making it both unsettling and remarkably powerful.

2. On inspiration for The Heart Goes Last

"I think anything and everything someone writes ultimately comes from real life."

Atwood spoke about the concept of prisons for profit and her participation in a march against the shutting down of prison farms in Canada as inspiration for her latest work.

3. On Justin Trudeau

"We have a prime minister who's so cool, we still haven't gotten used to it."

Atwood was all praises for the spunky new face of the Canadian government, described by her as "hip and sexy".

4. On Game of Thrones

"Game of Thrones dragons are pretty standard flamethrowers, they don't have conversations."

The author contested that the fantastic dragons in Game of Thrones fell flat in comparison to the brilliant depiction of the mythical creatures by Ursula Le Guin - dragons that were equally magical when conversing as when breathing fire.

5. On a superhero with an identity crisis

"He thinks, I'm a cat, a bird. Do I save the bird or do I eat it?"

Atwood spoke about her upcoming comic book superhero Angel Catbird who is part cat and part bird, giving rise to oddly funny situations like the one mentioned. When he is confronted with a bird, he doesn't know what to do - consume it or protect it?

6. On high and low culture

"What would Catwoman be? Ophelia after death?"

Atwood rubbished notions of literature as having hierarchies, instead encouraging a freely gluttonous consumption of words. She mused that separately categorised works often had striking parallels, humourously imagining Catwoman as areborn Ophelia from Hamlet.

7. On women's rights

"It was thought that women's bodies were so floppy that without corsets, they would just dissolve!"

Atwood rejected suggestions by an attendee that the women's rights movement had failed. She stressed that any movement developed in stages and women had come a long way from once being considered sub-human to securing fundamental rights to vote and work today.