I'd say that most of life seems to me to be that way, a mixture of the mundane and the mythic, when you're living the life of the mind.
What I find interesting and heartening, though, is that there does seem to be a shift in the subject matter being written about by women that is doing well in the culture. We're seeing more women writing dystopian fiction, more women writing novels set post-apocalyptic settings, subjects and themes that used to be dominated by men.
I'm not conscious of my own themes as I write first drafts, no, and in fact, I work hard to stay in that unconscious space and not ask myself what the novel is about or what my metaphors might mean because then, I think, you're just dead in the water.
As soon as you start to question your own intent while you're still in the process of discovering your story, you're in trouble because you've pulled out of that unconscious space that is so necessary in the beginning of the drafting process.
I don't see the direct correlation between my personal life and the novel I'm writing until I'm at the end of the novel or very close to it.
Fundamentally I think we all write the kinds of work we'd most like to read. Or we try to.
I've realized that with each novel I seem to set out a kind of puzzle for myself. And I am never sure in the process of writing a first draft how it's all going to turn out.
I'm a pop culture junkie. I'm a People magazine reader, an US Weekly subscriber; all of those celebrity magazines get my dollar.
As I get older, I'm finding that I recognize certain celebrities only because they frequently grace the pages of US Weekly, but beyond that, I have no idea what they do.
I don't mind being called a "feminist," as I certainly embrace the tenets of feminism, though it does feel a little sad to me that we need to call a novel "feminist" simply because the female characters are interesting and strong.
Having a magical element in a realistic setting without explanation seems to me to be the hallmark of fairy tales, which present us with a kind of metaphorical look at some aspect of our lives.
It's amazing what you can accomplish when you know you have to hit the ground running.
As writers, we live very much in our own minds much of the time, buzzing in our unconscious spaces as we go about the business of living in the world.
You're thinking about the continuum of life as you load the washing machine or scoop out the litter box.blue-girl-larger Or maybe that's just me. That seems to be an endlessly challenging and interesting way to live.
I've always gone with Kafka's model of establishing the world from the first line, as in Kafka's famous line from Metamorphosis, "Gregor Samsa woke up from uneasy dreams to find himself transformed into a gigantic insect" (or beetle or cockroach, depending on the translation). I have to have that first line before I can go further.
I feel that if I establish the world or the premise from the first line, then I can get the reader to come with me where I want her to go.
I think there's a fine line between being so obtuse that you lose the reader completely, which is the intention for some writers, though it isn't mine. I work hard at grounding the world as much as possible in the world we do recognize.
I think that absurdity in literature looks into a lack of meaning in some important and fundamental way. It allows us to ask questions in ways that other forms can't, or in ways we can't using solely traditional means.
Usually at the core of fiction that has some element of the absurd there tends to be an examination of some societal ills that we should talk about more than we do. And it's funny, of course, so we have that release valve with absurdism. It offers us a safe way to explore difficult subject matter.
I think it's still difficult to write about motherhood and anxiety, that talking about not wanting to be a mother or feeling ambivalent about motherhood makes people uneasy. The ambivalent mother is certainly much more interesting.
I tend to start with a fantastical premise, and then I place it in the world we know. Or, really, it places itself. Honestly, I feel that I have very little control of the magical aspect, as that's just what comes out for me.
As a reader I gravitate toward work that rests in the gray area, that doesn't come with easy answers.
My mom was a big Elvis fan and a general pop culture buff, and so I grew up in a house filled with what were then called "movie magazines,"Before Elvis when Rhona Barrett wrote her column about the stars. And so it seeped in.
When a certain show or film or celebrity captures the imagination of the masses that has a good deal to say about us, I think, and what is happening in our collective psyche.
I could have a lot of fun with Michael Jackson, I'm sure.
