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December 2019 | REDONLINE.CO.UKBeautiful, intricate and full of tiny moments of joy, Elizabeth Strout’s writing
is loved across the world. As she releases her new book, Olive, Again,
Natasha Lunn discovers how she packs her sentences with truthYour writing is full of tiny details
that feel so real. Do you collect
those from the world around you?
My earliest memory is of myself as
a writer and of watching and watching
and watching. We didn’t have a TV
when I was growing up and I spent
lots of time alone. Therefore, whenever
I saw a person, I was fascinated.
I’d stare at them and listen to them –
and I’ve never stopped. If I see
something, I’m very apt to remember
it, even after years. I will suddenly
remember that particular gesture,
or a couple I saw in a diner, and
then I’ll use it years later.
I think what makes your writing so
special are those small moments of
intense emotion. How do you manage
to pack such feeling into brief scenes?
I’ve been writing my whole life, and
I practised for many years before I was
published. I kept writing stories and
most of them were rejected for years.
It was as if I was compelled to do it;
it almost wasn’t a choice. There was
something in me that knew, I think,
that if I kept trying, I could find the
sentences that would convey what I needed them to. I kept
thinking, ‘Okay, it’s not quite good enough, let me try it this
way, or that way.’ All that time, I was trying to hone my own
storytelling voice – and then I finally got it. Partly, what was
happening was that I was trying to write as a writer. And then
I finally realised, ‘Don’t write as a writer – just write it.’
What would you say unites your characters?
Most of my characters are looking for some kind of affirmation
of themselves, without even knowing
it. Most of us probably are. We all
hope that someone sees our true self,
whatever that may be.In both Olive Kitteridge and Olive,
Again, why did you choose to write
Olive’s story through a collection
of other characters’ stories?
That came to me naturally and
immediately. The form of the book is
the book, essentially. She’s an awful lot
to take, Olive Kitteridge, and I thought,
boy, if I was the reader, I would get
very tired of seeing Olive on every
page. And different points of view have
always fascinated me. We think we
know somebody, and then somebody
else knows that person in an entirely
different way. I thought, okay, let’s
have different people in this town think
they know Olive in a particular way,
and then we’ll just see her in a variety
of her different selves. I realised that
every person had their own story,
because everybody does.What do you hope readers feel
by the end of your books?
I always hope that when a reader finishes one of my
books, they don’t feel as alone in the world, and they
realise that whatever they have felt or hoped or thought
has been felt or hoped or thought before, by somebody
else. The other thing is that I would like them to feel some
sense, even if it’s just momentary, of the world being larger
than they thought. A brief moment of transcendence. We’re
all here on Earth trying to do our best – most of us. Let’s
just take a big breath.‘We’re just all here
on Earth trying to
do our best’
Olive, Again (Viking, £14.99) by Elizabeth Strout is out 31st October PORT
RAIT^ OF^ ELIZABETH^
STROUT:^ LEONARD^CENDAMO‘WE ALL HOPE
SOMEONE SEES
OUR TRUE SELF,
WHATEVER
THAT MAY BE’