This is the first of what I hope will be many interviews with authors. Thanks everyone who submitted questions. The answers are below. If you have followups, let me know and I’ll see that Marlon gets them. And thank you, Marlon!
Marlon James was born in Kingston, Jamaica , in 1970. His first novel, John Crow’s Devil, was a finalist for the Los Angeles Times Book Prize, The Commonwealth Writers Prize and was a New York Times Editors’ Choice. His latest novel, The Book of Night Women was published in 2008.
This is from Susan in York, PA: How are you able to maintain such a strong voice through his Book of Night Women. The language and the way your narrator spoke had really great rhythm and immediately gave you a sense of time and place…but I can’t imagine trying to write an entire book that kept that going. How are you able to get yourself into that mindset when you sat down to write?
I think it’s an act of will. I think you have to shut off anything connected to how you live now, right down to not using words such as, “sped” because that’s connected to a concept of movement that would have been unfamiliar back then. Sometimes we think the trick to staying in character when that person is unfamiliar is to dive into tons of research for speech patterns, cultural eccentricities or whatever, and while that’s important, you can learn every single detail about a character and still fail spectacularly—John Updike’s Terrorist being a case in point. In trying to learn all the external things about his title character he missed everything that makes a character human: empathy in the author and a chance to change in the character. Start with that first. Accurate dialect, correct historical details and finishing touches will come later.
From Scott in York: How does do you go from idea to beginning to execute that idea? Do you outline (characters, plot, etc)? Or do just start to write and see what happens?
Both. I have a basic outline just to get my thoughts together, and then just as soon violate it as often as possible. It’s the act of writing that leads you to what you really want to write. This is where outlining or even research can fail you. It’s like driving at night; you can only see far, but if you don’t drive, you’ll never get to where you want to go.
From Joan in York: What is your favorite piece of classic literature?
Jane Austen’s Pride and Prejudice. There are tributes, homage and shameless rip-offs of that novel all over my new book.
What made you want to become a writer? When did you first decide it was what you wanted to do?
I can’t remember when I wasn’t writing. But taking it seriously was another thing entirely. It was 1998 and I had just read Shame. I was so outraged and impressed by the liberties he took with that book that I said, that’s it. I’m going to write, and I’m going to write exactly what I want to write instead of what I think people would want to read.
You’re a fan of Latin American literature (I know you loved The Savage Detectives and you always go on and on about Marquez). What do you feel are the big differences between modern Latin American fiction and American fiction today?
In the late sixties with John Barth declared the end of narrative, I don’t think he ever told us what was supposed to take its place. One of the main differences between the Latin American Fiction I’ve read and other types is that even the most avant- garde Latin fiction knows that something has to happen. And that thing that happens must have stakes beyond suburban ennui or little epiphanies that can sometimes seem unearned. It’s not about magical realism, because even the most magical of writers are still telling you what’s going on outside their window. But perhaps Latin American fiction even at its most inward looking never becomes self-absorbed. Never falls in love with the writing of itself.
Where did the idea for Book of Night Women come from?
From a discussion with the poet Rashida Abu Bakr. I had a story already about a female slave protagonist, and a rebellion. I had even written 43 pages, but the idea of a group of women replicating the traditional matriarchal African society and taking it down a dark turn would never have happen had Rashida not showed me the ways in which women left their impact on African society. I remember wondering, what if a bunch of women tried to set up that power core here? What would be the cost?
Do you usually start with character, situation or narrative?
Characters have a way of showing up in my head and not leaving until I write them into something. There are these albino twins that have been badgering me for a story for years.
You ran your own advertising business in Kingston while you wrote much of both of your novels. How the hell did you find the time?
You have to make the time. It’s ludicrous when people say they don’t have time to write. You may be a person that writes, but you’re not a writer. This may sound harsh but your writing talent (or muse) couldn’t care less if you have three kids and your first quarter report is due. Or that you just lost a parent or are expecting a child. It’s a demanding, remorseless, unreasonable talent and it will not be denied. You simply have to make the time or steal the time. We’re probably not as busy as we think. Wake up earlier, or go to sleep later, or get rid of the TV. Nancy Mckinley said that once your muse is convinced that you’re serious, she’d show up. But first you have to be serious. It’s just not a talent that you can tend to like a garden. It demands too much of your time and something might end up suffering. This is where you have decide. Sure you may have talent, but how badly do you want it?
How did you decide on the POV for Book of Night Women?
It decided itself. I had written it in the third person in Standard English and got no further than page 43. I knew the novel would not move one page further until the voice that was supposed to tell the story told it, but even then I was held back by fear. Who the hell was going to read a 417 page novel all in slave dialect?
You start John Crow’s Devil with a quote from Captain Beefheart. Do you listen to music as you write? What kind? Does it affect the finished product?
I have no idea. I don’t trust silence, and I don’t believe in it. I love when a line slips in when I least expect it to. John Crow’s Devil could not have happened without me listening to 16 Horsepower’s Secret South constantly. So much of that novel’s biblical vocabulary came from that album making those word flesh. Of course I can’t listen to that album now.
This is a site for aspiring writers. What advice do you have for writers who have yet to achieve publishing success?
A clichéd but important one. Believe in yourself. Because if you are a writer, you will come to a point, more than once, when you’re the only person who does.
