Author Profile – Virginia Euwer Wolff

Welcome to another of our author profile features. Today we’ll hear from prize-winning author Virginia Euwer Wolff. Raised in Parkdale, Oregon, Virginia now resides in Oregon City.

Last book read:

Nation by Terry Pratchett

What are you currently working on?

A novel that spans several generations in a family.

What are you currently reading?

Faulkner’s Light in August, Rita Dove’s Sonata Mulattica, and poetry by Lawson Fusao Inada.

What did you read growing up?

Books that were read to me: All the Pooh stories and A.A. Milne poems, Greek myths, Kipling’s Jungle Book, lots of others. Books I read: The Betsy-Tacy books, Nancy Drew, comic books, Mickey Spillane, J.D. Salinger, Charlotte Brontë, Dickens.

Favorite book?

It’s a tie between War and Peace and David Copperfield.

Favorite author?

Alice Munro and so many others.

Favorite poet?

Shakespeare and so many others.

How does Oregon influence your writing?

I see every landscape through the eyes of a native Oregonian, so that the most cacophonous of cities and the most dramatic of world monuments have to pass through my lens of a childhood spent in orchard and woods on the north slope of Mt. Hood. And every tonality in literature has to pass through my basic song of wind through cedar trees, summer sunrises, winter snow blowing. I feel like a newcomer everywhere else, even though I’ve lived in east coast cities for years at a time. So: When I’ve written about inner city lives (in three books), my touch is that of an immigrant who watched and listened, mouth pretty much agape, when, as a young college graduate, I moved to New York City and suddenly began to learn the bumpy vocabulary of concrete, subways, blinking neon everywhere, scores of foreign languages, museums I kept getting lost in, foods I’d never heard of, and, at night, never complete silent dark. Shaun Tan’s book The Arrival illuminates this kind of experience.

It’s said that stories for kids are often about home and away: The journey out, the thrilling and terrifying things to be learned en route, and the return home enlightened by the daunting hugeness of the great world outside–or, if not an actual return home, the discovery of some new place to make a home. I didn’t intend to live this pattern, but it has sort of attached itself to me.

How did you get involved with Literary Arts?

Through the Oregon Book Awards.

Why is Literary Arts important for Portland? Oregon?

Literary Arts brings to our attention the need for language to try to clarify and promote thoughtful living through poetry and prose, lyric and story. We live our lives in narrative, and if we read enough, we may find exactly our own. Literary Arts helps remind us of that.

How is Literary Arts important for writers?

Its arms reach out to every genre, and, through Writers in the Schools, it introduces adult working writers to kids who may be exploring writing for the first time. Its annual Fellowships have helped several authors over barriers between their manuscripts and publication. And the annual Book Awards bring to our attention books we might never have known about. (I’m not sure why playwrights were not included recently, though.)

Opinion of Oregon’s literary scene?

Oh, I think it’s beautifully fluid: sometimes celebrating the sanctity of our trees, hillsides, roaring ocean waves, many-headed weather, and eventful sky—and at other times worshiping urban hipness and Edge. With room for many other literatures in between. Oregon’s literary scene shifts, bends, opens itself to new forms, tonal shades, sensibilities. I still wish there were more connection between children’s authors and grownup authors, but this kind of acknowledgment takes time, and perhaps the appearance of graphic novels (some by Oregonians) can help build that connecting path.

What inspired you to start writing?

The huge search for the precise words to try to get at the astonishing sensations of existence, and the scary attempt to get the cruelty and beauty of life on paper. Somewhere, Virginia Woolf spoke of it as trying to catch the butterfly of existence by throwing a net over it.

What are your three favorite books?

As I said above, two of them are War and Peace and David Copperfield. So many could go in third place, but Crockett Johnson’s Harold and the Purple Crayon is a strong contender.

Where do you go to do your writing?

Into my beautiful studio with views of western red cedar trees, squirrels, birds, and sky just outside every window.

When writing, do you set goals for yourself (i.e. ten pages per day)?

Yes, but it’s amount of time, not number of pages. Weekday mornings are for writing only. Nothing interrupts that schedule, except the rare trip to the veterinarian. And I keep a work calendar; I make myself write a phrase or so, summarizing the progress I made on each day’s rectangle on the page; if I got no work done, a diagonal line goes through that box. At the end of a month, if there are quite a few diagonal lines, they’re a symptom of something gone wrong. As a veteran writer, I know it’s more complicated than simple sloth. My work motto: Millimeters of progress. I save the calendars so I can go back through the years that I spent on a specific book and trace the book’s trajectory (perhaps that’s too generous a word for a process that is nearly invisible to the naked eye). Each book takes me years to write; each lecture, speech, or essay takes months.

I was glad to find Anchee Min’s description of her writing process, because it is mine: “Like a long line of ants walking for blocks carrying a crooked cricket leg.”

What’s one piece of advice you would give to aspiring writers?

Go to museums. Museums of many different kinds. Because museums force us to ask questions we would not otherwise have asked. (“What’s that?” “Why would anybody want to sculpt that?” “Is that art?” “What makes it art?” “Am I allowed to laugh at it?” “Is that supposed to be a house or a poodle?” “They invented that in 1777?” “How did they think that up?” “They made that in Nigeria?” “That really came from an Egyptian tomb?” “What am I learning in this instant?”) And make notes. Everywhere.

Tags: Literary Arts, Virginia Wolff
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