My Guest this month is Irish Writer James Lawless, whose
novel Peeling
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Oranges I so enjoyed and commented on, HERE on on Life Twice
Tasted. Readers will be interested in James creative point of view and many of the points
he makes here will chime with both experienced and aspiring writers. He
certainly makes me want to read more of his books. W.
James says:
"I write what I hope is accessible literary fiction. Normally the
initial impulse is the itch of an embryonic character forming, and when I start
to work on him or her that dictates the
plot. In other words character driven narrative.
In some of my novels that demand historical research, the more I
research the more the work seemed to
take off like a type of osmosis from my reading. Because I write poetry, thia informs what has been described as the
sometimes lyrical style of my writing.
I think good and memorable writing is almost as important as a
good storyline and I strive to combine both, often spending a long time on the construction of a sentence or a mot juste.
How about the evolution of style and content in your novels? W.
Peeling Oranges, my first novel, was
driven by my quest to understand things that had been inculcated into me like
idealism, religion, nationalism and one’s native language. So this novel, as it
is with a lot of first novels, had autobiographical elements even though the characters
are fictitious.
From there I moved on
to a wider canvas. I write a novel essentially to find out something. For example my
second novel For Love of
Anna explored the
devouring monolith of capitalism and when I wrote Finding Penelope I wanted to see the world from a
woman’s point of view. I believe to be an artist one needs to be able take an
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And what about the writing process itself? W.
The writing
process affords me the freedom to explore the why? of things. I believe life is not what you make it (which is a
luxury for many) but what you make of
it. I believe there is an ascetic and
spiritual calling to be a writer or artist and, as Virginia Woolf would agree,
there is no time for messing about. That is not to say you take yourself unduly
seriously, just that you should take your art seriously.
So, how do you see the role of historical figures in your fiction?
W.
I used
historical figures in Peeling Oranges such as Franco and
de Valera and Michael Collins who have cameo roles, and in my latest novel American Doll I use a lot of factual
stuff about 9/11 as background. But I don’t believe in recreating say a
fictitious Michael Collins as a main character in a novel. I believe such
writing is a form of cheating and, while one does a certain amount of re-imagining,
it is not a true imaginative creation as a lot of material is ready provided.
Besides if I want to learn about Michael Collins, I would prefer to consult
primary factual sources, rather than have to wonder what is true in a second
hand interpretation.
Where did the original impulse to write come from? W.
The seismic
jolt of my mother’s sudden and premature death propelled me into writing. Up to
that time death was something remote that happened to other people.
Also there was a lot of insularity and provincialism when I was
growing up which I explored in an attempt, as Joyce would say, ‘to escape the
nets’. My European travels, particularly in Spain (I did a degree in Spanish), helped
to broaden my world view.
And which writers have inspired you? W.
I love Virginia
Woolf for her attitude to the novel as
an art form and the beauty and resonance of her prose as in To the Lighthouse. I admire James Joyce
of course for stretching our limits and Cervantes for starting the whole thing
off. I appreciate Pasternak for his
poetry and the purity of his vision and the sacrifices he made for his art are
an inspiration.
What about the role of research in your writing? W,
Up to now there are have been types of novels that I write: the
purely creative and then the creative
with research backup. For Peeling
Oranges I researched in the national archive which had opened to the
public at the time to reveal a lot of previously censored material about the
Irish and Spanish civil wars. The research took over two years before I even
started the novel. The novel Knowing Women however sprang from
the source of the creative well and factual references would have been
subliminal and contemporary. American Doll brought me back to research
again, which took about a year before I put creative pen to paper, although all
along I had the embryos of characters forming in my head.
And what do you particularly enjoy about writing?W.
As I said the opportunity it affords to explore the why of things. Sometimes in
conversation, one thinks in hindsight of what one should have said. Writing
gives you the time to say exactly what you mean. Also I would find life rather
dreary without having a story in its formation to carry around in my head.
Do you have a writing routine? W.
I have converted a small bedroom in my suburban house into a
study believing, as Virginia Woolf does, that one needs a room of one’s own to
create. The trouble is the internet frequently intrudes and I lack the will
power to turn it off. I counteract this frequently by having recourse to my
cottage in the mountains of west Cork which is internet free, and therefore is
better for forcing one to engage with the written word.
I write best in the morning, but a lot of my
time is taken up at the moment in corresponding with translators of my works. I
often take a manuscript with me on a sea holiday. Sitting on a chair close to
the waves is ideal for editing as well as being lenitive.*
And your latest work? W.
For Love of Anna is my
second novel and was originally published in 2009. It is heartening to know its
relevance is valued and it is still in demand, prompting a new edition in 2013.
There are three main strands running through it. Firstly, it may be read as a
poignant love story — Anna is a ballerina with whom the main protagonist, the
university student, Guido van Thool, falls in love.
But Anna is also an acronym for Anarchists of the
New Age, which brings us to the second dimension of the novel as an ideological
story positing ideas in the mind of the philosophy student Guido, in the wake
of the collapse of Russian communism and the dilution of oppositional politics,
on what alternatives there are to the all-devouring monolith of corporate
capitalism.
Anna wants to steer Guido away from this sort of
'dangerous' thinking, but his friend, the anarchist Philippe, keeps goading
him. Paralleling the lives of the lovers is that of a corrupt judge, Jeremiah
Delahyde (the third strand) who literally crashes into the world of Guido and
Anna on a fatal New Year's night."
You can check out reviews
of this book at http://www.amazon.com/James-Lawless/e/B001JOXD96
Opening lines of For Love of
Anna
Guido van Thool, blond head downcast
with little round spectacles perusing a book, is about to enter the door of
Loti’s café in the old quarter of Potence when he bumps into a girl, knocking
pumps out of her hands. He apologises, picks up the pumps, lets his book fall in
the process, picks it up and rising, reddens slightly, as his eyes are drawn to
long shapely legs protruding from a white wool coat.
The
girl smiles doe-eyed, and his mind becomes suffused with the idea that he has
just bumped into the most beautiful girl he ever saw, and she’s about to walk
away....
Publications.
Novels
Peeling Oranges
For Love of Anna
The Avenue
Finding Penelope
Knowing Women
Poetry
Rus in Urbe
Criticism
Clearing the Tangled Wood:
Poetry as a Way of Seeing the World
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