{"id":435,"date":"2020-08-31T16:00:50","date_gmt":"2020-08-31T21:00:50","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/engage.augsburg.edu\/howlingbird\/?p=435"},"modified":"2020-09-21T17:03:33","modified_gmt":"2020-09-21T22:03:33","slug":"q-and-a-with-howling-bird-press-author-jean-harper","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/engage.augsburg.edu\/howlingbird\/2020\/08\/31\/q-and-a-with-howling-bird-press-author-jean-harper\/","title":{"rendered":"Q and A with Howling Bird Press Author Jean Harper"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
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What is it about writing that energizes you?<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

What I appreciate most about writing is that I always discover\nsomething new in the process. Whether it\u2019s a brand new idea that starts a new\nproject, or a revision of an ongoing project, or an idea that wakes me up in\nthe middle of the night for how to resolve a writing problem, I am always\nlearning something new. New about the world, myself, ideas, the human\ncondition. Writing is a way in to all of that.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

What are common traps for aspiring writers?<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

I think this really varies writer to writer, but I see some\ncommonalities among my students. For instance, believing in \u201cwriter\u2019s block\u201d\nseems to trip up many aspiring writers. I personally do not believe in\n\u201cwriter\u2019s block.\u201d I might have at one time long ago, but a stint in writing on\ndeadline for a local newspaper cured me of writers block forever. There\u2019s\nreally no such thing, in my opinion. There may be problems writers face\u2014like,\nhow to describe that person, that moment in time; or, how to shoo away all the\ndistractions in life to get some quiet uninterrupted hours at your desk; or,\nhow to write about a very difficult experience\u2014but those are problems that are\nsolvable. I think if aspiring writers thought not of \u201cblocks\u201d but rather of\n\u201csolvable problems\u201d it might help.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Another trap is worrying too soon about publication. I have a\nfriend, a dear friend, who is writing a memoir. Someone in our writing group\nsuggested she get an agent, and find a publisher, now<\/em>. I shook my head: No, not yet. You haven\u2019t even figured out the\narc of the story yet. Write the memoir first. Then worry about the agent, the\npublisher, publishing. Just write.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Another trap, and this is corrosive, is envy. Someone somewhere is\nalways going to get a prize or a publication or a review that you don\u2019t get. That\u2019s\njust life. If you constantly compare yourself to the next new writer, you\u2019ll\neat yourself up with envy. Don\u2019t do it. Applaud everyone\u2019s success, and get\nback to your desk. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

What is your writing Kryptonite?<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

I had to look up what Kryptonite does! \u201cDeprives Superman of his\npowers.\u201d Hmm. I don\u2019t think I have a writing Kryptonite. That doesn\u2019t mean I\u2019m\nSuperman (or Supergirl), not at all. What it means is that writing is how I\nthink about the world. I\u2019m constantly writing inside my head, casting\nexperience into sentences. I may be sitting in a meeting looking attentive\nabout whatever my department chair is talking about, but really I\u2019m writing a\nscene for my novel, or revising a sentence, or turning a word over in my mind,\nlike a cool pebble inside my mouth. Writing is just who I am. Nothing can\ndeprive me of that power.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

What other authors are you friends with, and how do they help you be a better writer?<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Oh, so many writers, really. I have two wonderful poet friends I\nmet some years ago at a writing workshop, and we stay in touch by email,\ngetting together in real time and space as often as we can. We send each other\ndrafts of writing, sometimes just fragments, sometimes the whole thing. And we\njust talk about life too. The frustrations of getting it all done, what we are\nreading, recipes for all those tomatoes we\u2019ve grown.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I have another writer friend who is very strategic about her\ncareer as a writer; she is probably about twenty years younger than I am, and I\njust watch in a kind of wonder at her energy and determination. I take a lot of\ninspiration from our friendship, and she kind\nof views me as her academic mentor. It\u2019s a really interesting relationship.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

And there are writers out there who I have met, who are kind of\ngiants in their genre (I won\u2019t drop names); I\u2019ve learned something so very\nvaluable from the \u201cfamous writers\u201d: the best writers are often the most\ngenerous of human beings, willing to help in so many ways\u2014 making connections,\nchampioning your work, encouraging you to keep going, to keep writing. If I\never become a \u201cfamous writer\u201d I shall use these wonderful human beings as my\nmodel. There is no place for arrogance in writing, only generosity.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Do you want each of your books\/stories to stand on their own, or are you trying to build a body of work with connections between them?<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Very good question. I think my first and second book are linked,\nbut they each also stand on their own. I am very interested in a number of\nintersecting subjects: women, the Midwest, courage, kindness, and, of course,\nhorses. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The two projects I\u2019m working on now are 1) about women and\ncourage; 2) about horses and a girl and courage. So I suppose there is a\nconnection between all of this.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Did publishing with Howling Bird Press change your writing process?<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

I think a lot more now about the internal design of a piece. The\neditors working on Still Life with Horses<\/em>\nwere so acutely aware of how various parts of the story fit together (or\ndidn\u2019t) and made the book so much better by their attention. I think about this\na lot more now as I revise, which is really a gift.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

What have you done since you won the Howling Bird Press prize?<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

I have been working on two writing projects: One, a nonfiction\nnarrative about five generations of women in my family, going back to the wife\nof a whaleship captain in the mid-1800s. And, two, a novel set in Kentucky in\nthe 1970s about a young girl and her father and their hopes pinned on a\nracehorse. I\u2019m really enjoying working on the novel. It\u2019s a delightful\ndeparture from nonfiction. The joy of inventing is delicious.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

What did you do with your first advance?<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

I don\u2019t remember, honestly! I probably did something\nhorse-related. I currently have a Welsh Pony\/Quarter Horse cross who is just\namazing. I might have bought him a present, maybe a new saddle pad. Or, more\nlikely, I put the advance in the bank!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

As a writer, what would you choose as your mascot?<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

My father lived the last ten years or so of his life in a large\napartment overlooking a turn and pool in the Assabet River in Concord, Massachussetts.\nThe view from his window was so lovely, and Dad was always especially thrilled\nto see the resident Great Blue Heron wading and feeding in that pool. He took,\nliterally, hundreds of photographs of that sinuous bird. My father loved\nphotography, birds, science, nature, gardening, physics, music. Everything. He\nwas curious about the world and delighted by all of life. Dad died in 2016, and\nwhen I see a Great Blue Heron now, I think of my dad. <\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

What kind of research do you do, and how long do you spend researching before beginning a book?<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

For the horse novel, I spent several years making trips to\nKentucky, hanging around race tracks, talking to horse people, watching races,\nand training sessions, and just absorbing as much as I could. And, of course,\nreading a lot, and widely. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

For the nonfiction narrative about the women in my family, I made\na number of research trips to New England, to archives and libraries that had\nall kinds of holdings, from whaling logs, to letters my great great\ngrandparents had written, to photographs. And, reading everything I could get\nmy hands on.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I also take the advice of Nathaniel Philbrick who has said \u201cYou\nhave to buy the books.\u201d So, I have a really incredible library of books. I\nthink every writer should. And not Kindle or e-book versions. Books. Things you\nhold in your hand, turn the pages of. There\u2019s a tactile experience there that\nhelps with memory and imagination. I say this anecdotally, but I suspect there\nare studies too. <\/p>\n\n\n\n