Interviews
On Sunday, February 15th, barnesandnoble.com welcomed Alice McDermott to discuss CHARMING BILLY.
Moderator: Welcome, Ms. McDermott! Thank you for joining us on this sleepy and chilly Sunday afternoon. How do you usually spend your Sundays?
Alice McDermott: I like the sleepy part. It has been a long time since I thought of Sunday afternoons as sleepy times. Usually Sunday afternoons are a way of organizing for the rest of the week. So this is pleasure.
Beth from Cherry Hill, Pa: You have always published novels -- have you ever flirted with the short story form? What happened?
Alice McDermott: I started out as a short story writer. The first things I published were short stories. For a long time I thought of myself as only a short story writer. But when I sat down to write my first novel -- which I only did because I found myself with time to write -- I discovered that with that much time to write, writing short stories was difficult and daunting. So I began writing a novel. I discovered that writing short stories does not prepare you for writing a novel. They are totally different forms. And I also found out that writing novels -- the form -- is more to my liking.
Howard from Glen Cove, NY: Which short story writers do you most admire?
Alice McDermott: I would have to say, first and foremost, Vladimir Nabokov. For a writer, his stories are the most inspirational. All his stories are gems. And I think he's not known enough as a short story writer. I think his short story reputation was skewed by LOLITA. But that is changing. With the publication of the collected short stories, a lot of people are discovering him.
Mary from Freeport, NY: I come from a monstrous Irish family, and I must admit, you were dead-on with your depictions of an Irish wake. The careful attention to coffee, tea, and ice cream in little tin cups -- I've been there. I think you were channeling my relatives. Did you grow up in a similar family? If not, what kind of research do you do?
Alice McDermott: I didn't grow up in that kind of family. I grew up in an Irish American family, but I didn't have a big family. But I did have a lot of friends with Irish families of all sorts. I truly believed that grandparents had accents. I grew up in Elmont, NY, and all the people on my street were from everywhere else. I didn't have to do research, because I had been observing everyone for years. And as for the Irish, if you know one of us, you know us all.
Megan from Seattle, WA: I noticed that one of your favorite books to give as gifts is a children's book. That seems an unlikely, though wonderful, choice. What makes it a favorite?
Alice McDermott: It is such a delightful book. The line from it that really wins my heart is "the queens came late, but the queens were there." It's the other side of the three wise men -- all the people and beings who were in Bethlehem but were not mentioned. The three queens don't bring gifts for the baby but for the mother. Things like a homespun blue dress and chicken soup. It's fabulous for any mother who is reading it to her children. A little bit of payback maybe.
Vivian from Chicago, IL: I like that you used Dennis's daughter, "youth," as a catalyst for change. Is that a theme in other books of yours?
Alice McDermott: That's a good question. Probably it is. It was important to me in this novel to have that third generation somehow bringing this story into the future without taking the focus off of the lives of the generations before it. I suppose now that I think of it, it is a theme of mine, a young person who is observing and interpreting and then carrying the stories or the memories on into another future. It is probably tied to that idea of redemption that seems to crop up not only in Billy's ravings when he has had too much to drink, but in my consciousness as well. It would have to be that young voice that offers redemption or the sense of what endures over time.
Nicole from Albany, NY: In some ways, it is a good thing that Billy never married Eva. Dennis would have then married Mary, and his life would have been very unhappy. It seems as if someone had to lose out in this cycle of family you chronicle. In this case it is Billy. But couldn't it just as easily have been Dennis?
Alice McDermott: That's interesting. I don't know for sure that Dennis would have married Mary, and if he had married her I'm not so sure it would have been a bad thing. I suppose I had the sense from the start that it was so clearly not meant to be, that any of those what ifs would seem more like impossibilities to me.
Edna from Portland, OR: What do you think is the role of humor in fiction? You use it very subtly, and I really like it!
Alice McDermott: Thank you. I'm glad to hear that. I think humor is really important in fiction and in life. I sometimes despair because my novels often tend to deal with emotional things and people living and dying, and the humor often gets lost. I think it's important even in the face of living and dying that we keep our sense of humor -- especially in the face of dying.
Emily from Atlanta, GA: Would you classify yourself as a feminist? What do you think feminism is? I just ask because the strong characters in your books, the ones who weather storms, are always women.... I'd love your thoughts! Thank you!
Alice McDermott: Yes, I probably would characterize myself as a feminist if I had to. I don't have any problems with the word or the movement, but it does raise a lot of limiting ideas for people. It's true that women weather storms in my books, particularly in CHARMING BILLY. But I'm not sure that I have any political agenda in choosing her. It's just what women do. Keeping family histories, analyzing why family members do the things they do over hours on the phone, keeping track of current family for the future.I'm also aware of women's role in fiction and women's sometimes limited role in fiction. In this book I wanted a strong woman telling the story. I wanted to have a woman who was not recovering from a nervous breakdown or in the midst of a nervous breakdown or about to have a nervous breakdown. So with that goal in mind, my narrator was carefully formed. So that sounds like a feminist point of view. I did get a big laugh when a reviewer said, "How could a young woman see so clearly into other people's minds?"
Anne from Bloomington, IN: What kind of books do you read when you unwind (like on a quiet Sunday like today)? I always hit the classics, like Eliot and Fitzgerald, maybe a little Yeats....
Alice McDermott: Yeah, I think when it is late at night and I want to read something, I tend towards poetry. I love Wallace Stevens, Yeats. I still occasionally dip into Edna St. Vincent Millay. And I reread a lot lately. I am finding more and more that I go back to books that I love and find great pleasure in reading a book a third or fourth time. Or just enjoying it again. I am a pick-up reader. People send me books, and I pick them up and read them. So it's hard to map out any conscious reading list. When I don't have a book, I feel a little bit lost.
Cyndi Fosco from Round Lake, IL: Are you involved in book-signing tours when you publish a new book? If yes, are there any plans on coming to the Chicagoland area?
Alice McDermott: Yes, I am just about to embark on my tour. I'll be starting this week, and Chicago is on March 19th, at Barbara's bookstore.
Cory Fosco from Round Lake, IL: What did you think of the movie version of THAT NIGHT, and are there any plans to turn your other books into movies?
Alice McDermott: I didn't have much to do with the movie version of THAT NIGHT. I thought it was a sincere effort, but it was not the story I had told. Not my characters, and thematically it was trying to say something else entirely as well. It is still fun to see something you have written, in whatever form, on the screen. To see what someone else has made of it. I thought Juliette Lewis was very good.
Isaac from New Orleans: I think Dennis's lingering pain about lying to Billy is very honest and accurate. How did you capture the complexity of that sentiment?
Alice McDermott: Well, I am glad to hear that maybe I did. I think that the relationship between the two men was just something that I almost had to follow rather than to invent. I know that when I conceived of the novel, Billy, or a character like him, was the impetus -- the Irish cliché of the much-loved incorrigible drunk. I don't think it was too long into the working out of the novel that I realized that it wasn't about Billy but about the people around him. He wasn't interesting enough on his own, but the way people reacted to him and lived around him was. Dennis was always right there. I couldn't know Billy if I didn't know Dennis. Having that relationship early on in the novel made it seem like something that I could invent. Instead I explained it for myself and my readers.
Susan from Chimayo, NM: What brings you to the subject of alcoholism? The disease has such far-reaching implications for families; everyone is affected, as in CHARMING BILLY. Any thoughts?
Alice McDermott: As I was saying, I was drawn to the character of Billy. But I think I was also aware from the onset that I wasn't writing a novel about alcoholism. I was writing about this particular character, who, among other things, was an alcoholic. That is not to say that the alcoholism was in any way incidental. I discovered something when I was well into the book. I had a moment when I thought I should do a little reading about alcoholism, the alcoholic profile. The thing that struck me, that encouraged me to go on, was that any profile I could find about an alcoholic would always admit that, of course, all alcoholics are alike, but that you can't point your finger at any one thing that makes them alcoholics. And then the stories would turn around and say something particular about each alcoholic and what their life was like. So I think that within the profile of an alcoholic there is an insistence on our part, as human beings, of some kind of individuality. Even if the disease makes every alcoholic typical in some way, or even a cliché in some way. It was reassuring because that was what I felt each of my characters was doing.
Glen from Louisville, KY: This may seem an odd question, but why do you write? What compels you to put pen to the paper, so to speak, each day? I write myself (for myself), but I have trouble making myself do it every day.
Alice McDermott: It's probably the question. I write because I can't do anything else. I have tried. When I was in college, I had a wonderful writing teacher my second year. At that time I hadn't been considering writing as a career. When I handed in my first writing assignment for him, he called me down after class and said, "I've got bad news for you, kid. You are a writer and you will never shake it." I often tell my students that if they can do anything else they should do it. I think those of us who write fiction, we do it because we absolutely have to. There is no other way for us to live. There is nothing else for us to do that, at the end of the day, doesn't feel like time wasted.
Jane from Cleveland, OH: Many literary authors, like Robert Olen Butler and Frederick Busch, have teaching positions as well as being writers. Have you ever taught? Have you ever thought about it? I would love to learn writing from you. Thanks!
Alice McDermott: Yes, I have taught. Here, there, and everywhere, it seems. Right now I teach at Johns Hopkins. I have been fortunate enough to be able to teach part-time. So I haven't been in the position of feeling that my teaching time is stealing from my writing time. I find it rejuvenating to sit in the room with a bunch of writers. We are all struggling with the same thing -- each in our own way, of course. It's also nice to have people you can require to read things so you have someone to talk about it with. "You must all read this!" That's great. Except when they all disagree with you. But that is fun too.
Peter from Los Angeles, CA: Billy is not really a sad figure in your book, he seems more wistful, like a 6'1" sigh. Do you think of him as sad? Or is it his wife that is ultimately the sad one?
Alice McDermott: No, I don't think of either of them as being defined primarily by their sadness. I see all the characters in CHARMING BILLY as people who are making their way through the life they have been given. I don't see an unrelenting sadness, not even an unrelenting wistfulness about their lives. ALthough I do agree that in the telling and retelling of their lives they are lent a wistfulness and certainly a good deal of sadness. But Billy goes through his life the best he can. He has moments of great joy, even though it's not an easily definable joy. He has the love of many relatives and friends. I think he has the comfort of his romantic tragedy, or that is how he sees it. And his wife, Maeve, as well. To say that she is disappointed at times and confounded in her affections at times is true, but I think when she lies awake at night and waits for Billy to come home and counts her blessings, it's not ironic. She believes in those blessing and weighs them against her troubles. Their lives are more than just the single thing that seems to define them when they are being spoken about. Their lives are more important than that.
Moderator: Thank you so much for joining us! Do you have any writerly words of wisdom before we part?
Alice McDermott: Since I am about to embark on this book tour, I have to say the promotional aspect of writing novels always strikes me as incredibly ironic. Everything I have to say is in the book, and everything I haven't is in the next book if it is worth worrying about. But it is still nice to think that outside of the novel a writer might have some wisdom!