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Is it possible to be a good writer without being a good reader? I can only judge by my own experience, so I must say no. Writers, like all artists, stand on the shoulders of those who have created before them. I need the exposure to a variety of voices, tones, styles, even subjects in order to know what is possible. Writers before me show me what can be expressed, and what ought to be expressed. They have stimulated our imaginations so that we, feeling what has been written, are capable of more compassion, humanity, loving kindness. They teach me to slow down in my reading to savor the delicacy of an image or power of a sentence or brilliance of an idea. They encourage me, tantalize me, challenge me, and I kneel before them in gratitude. According to a report of the Independent Book Publishing Association, over five million American adults belong to reading groups. What, do you believe, is the basis for this country's love for literature and books? We owe the love of reading to those unsung heroes of the classroom, the English teachers who have exposed us to what is beautiful and powerful and intriguing and captivating—that is to say, what can be done with words. They taught us to care about imaginary characters, and to live vicariously through the pages of a book. They encouraged us to cry out against injustice, or just to cry at someone's sorrow rising from a page. They dared us to laugh and to think and to write. They read aloud to us, sharing their rapture in a nursery rhyme, a sonnet, a philosophical thought. They have made the pages sing. Oh Lord, where would our nation be without them? Have you ever belonged to a reading group? Yes, for too short a period, but I long for the time when I can join one again and read more broadly than I do presently, since much of my current reading provides a foundation for my historical fiction. Right now I am too driven by reading for my writing. But some day, my ideal reading group would consist of people of different ages and backgrounds, different religions and world views, different levels of experience and education, and definitely both genders. I would like to be able to depend on some group members to make me care about characters who have not moved me on their own; other group members to read passages aloud; still others to point out brilliant lines and passages that I might have glossed over. I often do phone chats with book clubs composed of people I do not know. The sincerity of their questions and comments coming across the line prompts me to be spontaneous and revealing. Sometimes we laugh uproariously. Other times, we are moved by something and the conversation stops and across the miles, we cling onto a thought or a feeling. Although there is silence together, there is not emptiness. There is communion. It's quite magical when it happens unexpectedly. What advice do you have for reading group members when it comes to selecting books for discussion? It's essential, I think, for there to be variety. Mix long books with shorter ones, contemporary with classic, serious with light, fiction with nonfiction. And don't shy away from story collections. Wonderfully different evenings can be had by having each member speak about one story in a collection. What books are you reading now or do you plan to read? Currently I'm reading three nonfiction books, which is rare for me. They are: M.F.K. Fisher's Long Ago in France, a memoir of her discovery of the French art de vivre; Andy Marino's A Quiet American: The Secret War of Varian Fry, an account of this man's efforts during the German occupation of France in World War II to shelter and provide escapes for Jews, intellectuals, writers, and artists wanted by the Nazis; and Francine Prose's Reading Like A Writer: A Guide for People Who Love Books and for Those Who Want to Write Them. She is an extraordinary teacher. Her book is filled with examples chosen to illustrate various skills, through which she shares her appreciation. When I finish these, I'll go back to Proust's Swann's Way, the first volume of Remembrance of Things Past. I wish I had Francine Prose—or a good book club—to read it with. I miss so much otherwise. If you were stuck on a deserted island and could only bring one book with you to read, what would it be and why? Oh, too hard. Too hard. The only book fit for the occasion, besides the standards (the Bible and The Complete Works of Shakespeare) would be one step from the Bible: Mary Baker Eddy's Science and Health, with Key to the Scriptures, which would provide wisdom and hope and encouragement and the understanding that my thinking would craft the experience. If you could have dinner with three writers (dead or alive) who would they be and why? Hmm. Harper Lee, because she teaches humanity with such tenderness, humor, and goodness; Sena Jeter Naslund, because of her literary insight and her caring, and because she is my friend; and William Shakespeare, so we could hear his words roll out reciting Sonnet 29. I would love to listen while the two women asked him questions, cornering him perhaps. What would his answers be? Have you ever read anything you're too embarrassed to admit (except in this interview)? I can't think of anything. Favorite book when you were a child? Robert Louis Stevenson's A Child's Garden of Verses. It was Stevenson who instilled in me the sense that images and words can complement each other. If you have children, is this the same book you read to them? If not, what is your favorite book for your children? I don't have children, but if I did, I would sing Stevenson's verses to them so they would always remember, as I do, that joyous innocence. Favorite heroine in literature and why? So many come to mind. Tess. Sue Bridehead. Jane Eyre. The Wife of Bath. Mrs. Dalloway. No, I think it would have to be Scout Finch, for saying one of the greatest lines in literature, a statement of acceptance and understanding and compassion and love, “Hey, Boo,” acknowledging him on his own terms, without requiring anything more of him than what he'd already given, the sacrifice of his reclusive life, a sacrifice given freely, out of love for a little boy. In those two words she shows she has learned from Boo's example the importance of caring in a profound and appropriate manner for those different from ourselves. To my way of thinking, this little girl shows us the redemptive grace of which we are all capable. That's heroism. Favorite hero in literature and why? Without a doubt, Paul Baumer, from Erich Maria Remarque's All Quiet on the Western Front, the German soldier who shares the agony of a dying enemy soldier through a long night together in a shell hole with this classic, anti-war monologue: “I didn't want to kill you, but you jumped in here like that. What would you have done? It's just that I've never met you before like this, face to face. Just saw your uniform and bayonet...We could be brothers, but they never want us to know that. We each have mothers, fathers. The same fear of death. The same pain. The same everything, everything. Forgive me, comrade. Favorite first line from a book? “It was the best of times. It was the worst of times.” Why best? Why worst? One must read on. But I also love: “You don't know about me without you have read a book by the name of 'The Adventures of Tom Sawyer, but that ain't no matter.” That voice! Favorite last line from a book? “. . . the refuge of art. And this is the only immortality you and I may share, my Lolita." Book that changed your life? Ironically it is a book that kept me from something. Reading A Farewell to Arms in college, I was so moved and frightened by Hemingway's portrayal of Catherine's prolonged pain and ultimate death in childbirth, so devastated and tricked by the outcome, that I rejected the 1950's ideal of womanhood and never wanted to have a baby, and I never did. Words to live by? Two sentences:
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