One Woman's Writing Retreat: Linda Grant Interview

Linda Grant

Linda Grant agreed to be interviewed via e-mail by Jillian Leslie.

JL: Congratulations on winning the prestigious Orange Prize for Fiction, 2000. Beside the obvious external perks, what does winning this prize mean to you?

LG: Mainly, recognition. The Orange is an extremely important international prize and to win from such a strong field is an extraordinary act of support for any writer.

JL: The meat of When I Lived in Modern Times, takes place in Palestine, right after World War II. The protagonist, Evelyn Sert, is a young British Jew, idealistic and anything but worldly, when she arrives to carve a new life for herself in a multicultural land, a land strained with violence and tension. What was your biggest challenge developing her character and her fictional world? How do you hope readers will interpret her?

LG: It's quite hard to remember what it was like to be 20 from the vantage point of nearly 30 years later. In both my novels I have created characters who are more or less uneducated and one can't take for granted what they do or don't know even about ideas that were current in the times they lived in. But I want my readers to see her not just as the product of a certain moment in history but as the epitome of all of us who at certain times in our lives have been taken up with idealism, by the notion that there are ideas that are bigger than ourselves and that give those selves meaning.

JL: This is a book equally heavy in character, plot and setting. When you conceived the idea, which came first?

LG: A few months before the fiftieth anniversary of the founding of the state of Israel I began to think about what this must have meant for my parents' and the rest of their generation. I knew that I wanted to write a novel set at around that time and that it would concern a naive young woman who travels to Palestine to fight for the new state but it wasn't until I went there, in March 1998, that I realized that the city of Tel Aviv would be the metaphor for Evelyn's idealism.

JL: This novel is definitely not a fluffy beach read (though it's a witty and always enjoyable journey). Instead, it's a book of thought and substance, a book that causes people to gather around the dinner table and have hours of discussion about weighty topics such as religion, politics, bigotry, idealism, classism and elitism. With all the important ideas in this novel, what do you hope readers will take with them, long after turning the last page?

LG: At one point in the book Evelyn is asked to make a practical political decision. As an author I make no judgement about whether she was right or wrong but I do ask people to think about what it is like to make a political commitment when the outcome will determine the whole of your future. From my vantage point, here in London, I get very frustrated about what is going on in the Middle East, but I have to acknowledge that people who are in the maelstrom of a difficult political situation do not have the luxury that I have of getting it wrong.

JL: This novel paints a vivid portrayal of a turbulent, important era in history. In another interview you said when you researched this book, you found little information on Tel Aviv in that post World War II time period, and much of your information came from your visit to the area, walking around the city and talking to people who lived back then. Since your book depicts the time and place so clearly, how did you know you when you had gathered enough historical information to re-create the time period with as much accuracy as possible?

LG: I'm not sure that I ever really did know. I had to take a deep breath and hope for the best. Fortunately, a close friend who read the first manuscript was born in Israel in 1949 and remembered Tel Aviv from the early '50s, he said I'd captured it exactly so I've had to take his word for it. So far, no-one has said, no, it wasn't like that at all.

JL: Describing your feelings about the history in your book for Amazon.co.uk., you said, "We have no choice but to live through the portion of history that is allotted to us and from the vantage point of someone born years after the events I describe in this book, I feel envy and compassion." Compassion is understandable. Why envy?

LG: Envy because these people were such optimists; they really felt that they were building the new Jerusalem. They had put the past behind them and they were trying to create a brand new country. They had no guilt, had no mistakes to put right, it was for them the dawn of a new humanity. I envy all idealists for that.

JL: Did your personal beliefs as a Jew deepen or alter after researching about DPs (displaced persons) in this time period? What did you discover about yourself as you wrote this book? What lessons did you learn?

LG: I was born in a very traditional suburban Jewish household in which being pro-Israel was taken for granted, indeed much of my parents' social life revolved around fund-raising activities. Later I became highly critical of Israel and many of my friends would describe themselves as anti-Zionist and pro-Palestinian. When I examined the history of the period immediately after the war and tried to think what I would have thought and felt and done without the benefit of hindsight, I knew that I would have been passionately pro the creation of a Jewish state. I think it was simply inevitable and it is futile to dwell on the injustice of it. One can only do what one can to ensure that the future is resolved.

JL: In your research, did you learn that many people had to become chameleons, live different identities, like Evelyn, to survive in that swiftly evolving land?

LG: I think that it's more to do with the nature of women as chameleon, assuming different forms through hair and clothes and make-up and how useful that is if you are a spy. And in Evelyn's case, she's doing this at a time when people believed that is was possible to rid themselves of the idea that there was some elemental Jewish identity. Everyone in the book is engaging with the idea of whether it is possible to reinvent the new Jew for the new land.

JL: What did you enjoy most about writing this novel? Is there anything you'd change or add if you had the chance?

LG: I loved describing the city. I'm not a travel writer, but it was so exciting to write about a place that unlike say New York or Venice or Jerusalem, hasn't been written about a thousand times before. Don't get me started on what I'd change--I suspect of most writers had their way they'd keep on writing a book until they had to give the advance back.

JL: You have a flourishing career writing both fiction and nonfiction. What initially inspired you to be a writer? What writers have inspired you?

LG: I became a writer because I was very good at English at school but not very good at anything else. I was an only child until I was eight so I read a LOT. This was in the days when tv in Britain didn't start until around 5 pm. In terms of writers inspiring me - two major figures, first Jean Rhys who was the most astonishing stylist and an unflinching chronicler of woman's lives, particularly outsiders. But she is very, very painful to read. Second, my main man, Philip Roth. I love the guts, the passion, the vitality of his work.

JL: Do you feel the Internet is a reliable tool when it comes to researching a historical novel?

LG: Well, there's a small paragraph in this book about Norton motorbikes and the information for that came directly from the Norton website.

JL: When writing a novel relying heavily on historical accuracy, do you recommend writing from a detailed outline or is it possible to freewrite, assimilating information from detailed notes? What did you do?

LG: I NEVER have a detailed outline. As far as I'm concerned, starting a novel is like getting on a boat, slipping the anchor and seeing which direction it heads in. After a bit you can start steering but you need to know where it's going first. I didn't even have very detailed notes. If I wanted to know something, I just looked it up as it went along.

JL: What sort of novels should we expect from you in the future?

LG: My next one, which I've just started, is set in Liverpool, my home town, in the present. It's a little less concerned with politics but the city will still figure in it a big way. It's about an affair between a British woman and an American man and it's partly looking at the sometimes inexplicable differences between men and women.

Copyright © by Jillian Leslie, 2001.

Jillian Leslie's articles have appeared in Family Circle Magazine, Bed and Breakfast Journal, Oregon Coast Magazine, Oregon Parks Magazine and Northwest Travel Magazine. She is the webmaster of EverydayWarriors.com. Read more about her here.

About the Author:

The Orange Prize for Fiction
Order When I Lived in Modern Times from Amazon.com.

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