10) Provence seems to have a special appeal to you, first Arbonne and now Ysabel What is it about the area that attracts you in particular?
What’s not to like? More seriously (though that’s actually not unserious!) it is such a gorgeous part of the world and for someone with any interest in history, it is such a crossroads of cultures (because of that beauty, in fact, which is a theme of Ysabel). I can get very depressed when I think about the state of France today, but can also be deeply and powerfully moved by what I see when we’re there. Years ago, I remember asking our French landlord at the time where he and his wife were going for their spring holiday. He looked at me with surprise. ‘I’m in Provence,’ he said, ‘spring is coming. Why would I go anywhere?’
11) In the story of Ysabel, you have a character mention an original Greek trader who was picked as husband by a Celtic princess. Is there a story like that which you then extrapolated the history of the area onto, or is the love triangle a complete invention?
I always worry about spoilers, and you’ll know I’ve deleted and dodged a few questions to avoid them in this exchange, but I suppose this one feels all right. I didn’t invent it, I was inspired and engaged by reading the founding myth of Marseille (Massilia) from Greek times, which sets out this legend. I even saw, at an outdoor antique sale, a 19th-century wooden carving of the figures (really should have bought it!).
12) I've been having a discussion with a couple of other authors I know about, what we strive to do with our writing and what we look for in our reading material, and I've been going on about infusing reality with magic and how much that appeals to me. Ashok Banker, who has recently adapted The Ramayana and is making it his life's work to do the same with all the great Indian epics, says, (loosely) he's looking to imbue myth with reality. How would you describe your approach to your work within that framework, especially Ysabel? Or is it even appropriate?
I’m currently most engaged by examining how the past doesn’t leave us (whether personal or cultural, small or large-scaled). Myth and legend, religious transition, folklore and propaganda … all of these play roles in this. We live in a startlingly a-historical era with far too little knowledge of even the recent past, the mistakes made, the truths learned once and forgotten. Assumptions that the ‘way things are’ has always been so, an arrogance about ‘today’ (the flipside is a western self-flagellation element, and this, too, turns on a lack of historical awareness). I think fantasy is a superlative tool, when used properly, to induce readers to shed prejudices about a given period (and their intimidation by it) and to look at a tale set in a fantasy analogue of a given time as being more not less connected to them … in the same way that when we read in a fairy tale that ‘the only daughter of a fisherman walked down to the strand…’ we are all linked to that only daughter (or the third son of a woodcutter!). This is what folktales were (and are) about … erasing the distance between reader/listener and story.
Article comments
1 - Imani
That was a great interview: I really appreciated your focus on his work rather than the typical "how do you like promoting? What's your favourite colour?" questions with which so many authors are plagued.
Canadian stores do indeed have his books out in force and I'll be getting it ASAP.
2 - Natalie Bennett
This article has been selected for syndication to Advance.net, which is affiliated with newspapers around the United States. Nice work!
I'd say this is possibly the best interview I've every read on BC Magazine!