Question: You said on your Web site, www.katiewillard.com, that Raising Hope started out as "a sort of love letter to your daughter." What do you mean? Please talk a little more about that love letter and the message you wanted most to deliver to her.
Answer: I wrote Raising Hope during my daughter's kindergarten year, a bittersweet time for me. While I was excited for my child and for myself at all of the possibilities that lay ahead, I also mourned the loosening of that intense, early childhood parent/child connection. I was thinking a lot at that time about the inevitable progression of separation between parents and children, which led to a contemplation of the final separation-death. I, like every other mother I know, have an absolute fear of dying before my work in raising my daughter is through. This book was a way of talking back to that fear; it was a way of mapping out my heart on paper so that-no matter what-my daughter always would have a way to reach me, to connect with me.
The message I wanted to deliver to her was one of hope and love. The characters in Raising Hope meet life head on and grow into people fuller and stronger than they ever imagined they could be. I think if we are open to life, we have so much potential to grow into and beyond our best selves.
Q: It is also interesting that this book developed in a writers' workshop. Could you tell us a little more about what actually happened? Also, your workshop experience sounds extraordinary. What qualities in a workshop would you recommend to other writers that might help them find a learning experience like yours-and make the quantum leap you did from an idea to a beautiful, complex novel?
A: I almost didn't apply to the writers' workshop in which I wrote Raising Hope. It was quite a risk for me to take myself seriously as a writer. Joining the workshop was a public statement that writing was important to me; it was the first step in acknowledging that writing was something I wanted to pursue.
My workshop experience was extraordinary because I had a gifted, committed teacher. Art Edelstein taught me so much about the craft of writing and, equally important, treated me like a writer. Art took me seriously before I was able to take myself seriously. He believed in all of his writers and this is what made him the remarkable teacher and human being he was.
Q: Raising Hope is a multilayered novel of many voices-it is complex in structure as well as theme. How did you come up with your main characters? Are they autobiographical? How much of you is Sara Lynn?
A: I came up with the characters of Ruth and Sara Lynn many years ago. Before the writers' workshop, I'd written on and off throughout my life, throwing my work into a cardboard box when it was finished. When I was contemplating the idea of joining the workshop, I opened my box and found some old pieces about Ruth Teller and Sara Lynn Hoffman. They weren't raising Hope in the stories-that development didn't occur until later-but they were characters who piqued my interest. I wrote several pieces for the workshop that had nothing to do with Sara Lynn and Ruth, but I kept coming back to these characters, ultimately creating Raising Hope.
The characters are not autobiographical. Yes, Sara Lynn and I both attended Harvard Law School. We also are both passionate gardeners. But she's not me. When I write a character that resembles me too closely, I get bored. There are pieces of myself in every character, but these pieces get mixed up and changed around. They have to-or I'd fall asleep at my computer!
Q: The family of Hope, Sara Lynn, Ruth, and Mamie is all female. The men in your book are either absent, dead, or, like the two boyfriends, Sam and Jack, playing minor roles. That's interesting and probably significant. What was your idea behind taking men out of the picture, so to speak?
A: As a feminist, I consciously celebrate women. I love women: we are mysterious and complicated in our bodies and our souls. Men are fine (especially my husband, who is very, very fine) but I'm just not as interested in what makes them tick. I also think men have plenty of opportunities to voice who they are; my book unapologetically is not one of them.
Q: The town of Ridley Falls is clearly divided by social class, the Tellers on one side of the tracks and the Hoffmans on the other-or at least it was when Sara Lynn and Ruth were growing up. Are you saying that class lines are blurring in America? Or not?
A: I don't have the knowledge to speak to this question with any sort of authority. I will say that, based on my limited experience, I do not believe class lines are blurring in America. I think wealthy people have no real conception of what it is to be poor, and I hope my book shows just a little of that struggle in the character of Mary Teller. Would Mary have been able to give her children more emotionally if she weren't so physically and mentally exhausted from trying to make ends meet? Probably so. However, I think my book also shows that human beings have the same longings to love and be loved, regardless of their income level.
Q: You have also revealed that some of the books that helped to shape your writer's sensibility are the Little House series, Little Women, Virginia Woolf's To The Lighthouse, and Eudora Welty's Delta Wedding. These books all focus on women and families. Can you tell us more?
I do admire books about women and families. I think families are powerful forces that have a tremendous influence on the people we become, and therefore on society as a whole. I find it puzzling when people denigrate "domestic fiction" because, if you think about it, the home is the seat of a great deal of power. Parents (especially mothers in our society) are forming the hearts and minds of our world's future. That shouldn't be underestimated.
Q: When you were commenting on Delta Wedding, you also wrote: "Ordinary life can carry a novel-no plot devices necessary." Since none of the women in your novel have an "ordinary life," what do you mean exactly?
A: I see the women in my novel as being very ordinary, in the sense that they lead quiet, unassuming lives. However, everybody has a story. I'm struck by this all the time-on the subway, walking in the city. As I pass through hordes of people, I always think, 'Oh, the stories that each of these people could tell.' I think the ordinary is extraordinary-every person has within them personal stories and dramatic conflicts that could be the basis for a novel. That's what I admire so much about Delta Wedding-nothing happens, but at the same time, everything does.
Q: How did you learn to write dialogue? When it came to speech patterns, such as Ruth's, that greatly differ from your own voice, what helped you make it authentic?
A: I write dialogue by inhabiting the character who is speaking, in the way an actor inhabits a character. It's tremendous fun, probably the most fun part of writing for me. I get to try on different personalities and live in them for a while. I can't say that I know what made Ruth's voice authentic, except that I could become her when I was writing her. I think we all have a myriad of different facets inside ourselves; I tap into the various pieces of myself when I write different characters.
Q: You started out as a lawyer. Then you became Zoe's mother. Now, you are a professional writer. How do these roles connect-or disconnect? And do you feel that choosing to be a writer is as much a lifestyle choice as a professional one?
A: These various phases in my life do connect. Practicing law taught me how to stick with a project until it was finished, even through parts of the project that might be difficult or uninteresting. Mothering teaches me about so many things, including joy, passion, and having a sense of mission. When I write, I throw my whole self at the project, including all of the experiences (professional and personal) that have molded me. Choosing to be a writer is certainly a lifestyle choice. I'm fortunate enough to be able to fit my work around my life, as opposed to making my life fit around my work.
Q: In a few places in your novel, you write that girls are being told today that they can be anything they choose to be. Yet wasn't the same message given to Sara Lynn and Ruth? Is that message true?
A: I don't believe that Ruth and Sara Lynn had a sense of possibilities in their youth. They were on very rigid tracks as early as childhood, not specifically because of gender, but because of social class. I think when a person limits herself for any reason, however, that sense of limitation is bound to seep into other areas of her life. Raising Hope is really about shaking off those limits and having faith that the process of living will make you a more amazing person than you ever dreamed possible. If we truly believe girls can become anything, maybe we can push the limits of what boys can be as well. Maybe we can expand possibilities for everyone, regardless of gender, race, and class.
Q: You've also written, on your Web site, about the way motherhood changed you, empowered you. Do you think you could have become a writer without having become a mother? What specifically happened that motherhood radically changed so many aspects of your life?
A: I don't believe I could have become a writer without having become a mother. At this point in my life, I am a strong person with a tough and true sense of myself. I just wasn't that way until I became a parent. Loving my child so much helped me to love and value myself in a deeper way. I discovered a sense of peace, too, as motherhood was and continues to be my window into what's important. Ninety percent of what we worry about is nonsense. When we pare all that away and focus on the ten percent that matters, we become grounded and real. That's the place from which I write-that true self that blossomed through mothering and that just seems to grow with age and experience.
Q: Your themes-family, identity-seeking, friendship, mothers and daughters-in Raising Hope are intimate yet universal. Although you explore inner lives, you don't offend. Nothing shocking, controversial, or tragic happens "on stage" in your book. Yet your book is deeply emotional. Does this reflect your own inner world and comfort zone?
A: Raising Hope is a gentle book, and, yes, it does reflect my sensibilities. There isn't anything offensive or shocking in it because there wasn't a need for that kind of material in this particular story. That's not to say that shocking material won't show up in another book, but I'd bet against it. I write stories I want to read and I just don't enjoy reading about excessive violence or meanness. Writing a novel is a huge commitment of time and energy and I want to spend my resources on characters and situations that touch my emotions but ultimately make me happy. There's enough ugliness in this world that I don't feel the need to add to it.
Q: Is writing fun for you? Is it easy? Would you reveal the nuts and bolts of your "writing life" . . . and, perhaps, some of the struggles of your own inner life?
A: Writing is fun when it's going well and frustratingly hard when it's not. That said, it's a pretty cushy job, so I'm not going to complain about how difficult it is.
The nuts and bolts of my writing life involve reading, observing, thinking, and writing. I read to learn craft; I observe to learn about people; and I think about my characters-who they are and what drives them. These tasks are as important as the actual writing.
The struggles of my inner life are pretty universal. I want to be a good person who loves and is loved; I want to heal the broken parts and celebrate the strong parts of myself as best I can; I want to make the world a better place in my own quiet way.
Q: What's in your future? More children? Another novel? Another garden? What are your new fantasies of becoming?
A: I leave the door wide open as to what the future holds. I've learned not to make too many plans because life finds a way of letting itself in and leading me to interesting places if I let it. That said, I am at work on another novel, and I continue to be utterly enthralled by my family and my gardens. My goal is to live fully every day.
Excerpted from Raising Hope © Copyright 2012 by Kate Willard. Reprinted with permission by Warner Books. All rights reserved.
• Click here now to buy this book from Amazon.
top of the page
