Proved on the Pulses: On the Essay and its Literary Cousins

An Interview with Russell Wangersky

I’ve been an admiring (and sometimes envious) reader of Russell Wangersky’s prose since I first encountered it almost a decade ago in the lit journals, where we frequently competed in the same contests. Burning Down the House, the precise and gripping memoir that Russell based on some of those early essays, is now in the running for some much bigger prizes, such as the BC Award for Canadian Nonfiction, Canada’s richest CNF prize (which it won earlier this year), and the Edna Staebler Award, for which it was recently nominated. Russell began as a journalist and is now an accomplished writer in multiple genres, including short fiction and the essay; his novel is forthcoming in 2010.

Q: You’ve written and continue to write in multiple genres – journalism, creative nonfiction, and fiction. What is the particular appeal of creative nonfiction to you? What draws you to this genre as a writer?

A: Creative non-fiction is both enticing and frustrating – enticing, because of the fun of moving through experience and working elements into a narrative line, but frustrating because stories don’t draw to the strong peak they might otherwise reach in fiction. You’re both helped and hamstrung by the truth. You always know where you’re going – without always knowing how you’re getting there – but you don’t always know if the story will be strong enough. Until, finally (hopefully), you know that it is. I’ve actually been drawn to creative non-fiction by my particular work in journalism – I write columns that are about whatever I want – they draw on memory, my personal experience, and sometimes the experience of others, and often involve drawing up remembered experiences to illustrate or highlight new events. My own voice is also the easiest voice – you hardly ever put a foot wrong.

Q: What draws you to the genre as a reader? Who are some of your favourite writers of creative nonfiction or memoir, and what appeals to you in their work?

A: As a reader, I like the fact that you feel like your footing is always safe. I guess that’s a little facile – but what I mean is that the footing is already tested somehow by experience. The other thing I particularly like is the consistency of voice by the writer. I’ve been reading creative non-fiction for years, since before it was even called creative non-fiction, and many stick out in my memory, new and old.

Report from Engine Company 82, by Dennis Smith, The Making of a Surgeon by William Nolen, and The Glass Castle, by Jeannette Walls, are all favourites from one point in my life or another, and that’s only the tip of the iceberg. What I like about those three in particular is the combination of extraordinary events told retrospectively, so that there’s not only the immediate drama of the circumstances, but also the weight of how the experiences have changed the writers.

Q: Do you find it difficult or stimulating (or both) to move between different genres? Have you ever used the same material and put it to different uses in fiction and creative nonfiction?

A: I like moving between the two, because, strangely, my fiction almost always begins in non-fiction. Almost all of my fiction work depends on hearing or seeing something, and imagining how things would turn out if that single instance was the anchor for a whole life. I have used non-fiction experiences in fiction for sure – a new collection of short stories will have two firefighting stories, stories that spring out of particular experiences I had while fighting fires.

Q: During our panel discussion at the Vancouver International Writers’ Festival in 2008,  you mentioned that Burning Down the House grew, in part, out of individual essays that you had written. Can you tell us something about the process of turning those essays into a full-length narrative? What was gained – or lost – in the process?

A: What was lost was the cohesive strength of the shorter essays: I broke them up and moved them around in Burning Down the House, and while they were still strong and significant for the narrative, I think they lost something of the jewel-like precision they had in the beginning. I think essays are like short stories – they gain part of their particular strength because the whole concept of them is defined enough that you can hold the whole package in your head at one sitting. I can work on the beginning of an essay, strengthening its development towards the end, with almost every word in my head. I think it makes essay tighter and more singular – and more effective. It’s much harder to hold the same tension throughout a whole book, and I’m not even sure readers want something pulled that tight for say, 64,000 words or more.

Q: What was the biggest challenge you encountered in writing Burning Down the House?

A: Nightmares. I thought that writing the book would be cathartic. It wasn’t – it dredged up everything right to the front of my brain again, and kept it live. I was tormented by nightmares all through the writing, and still am – especially on tour or at readings, where people inevitable come up to me to share their own accident or fires experiences.

Q: What was the greatest reward?

A:  I’ve heard from a handful of emergency services personnel who have found the book to be a great help overcoming their own demons – at least four are back to work, regularly in contact with me, and I feel (hopefully,perhaps) that I’ve had a part in that.

Q: What might you tell aspiring writers to read, and why?

A: Read lots. Read every genre you can. One of the best things about journalism is that I exercise my reading and writing muscles every single day. It’s like a foreign language – you have to use words until they are all second nature.

Q: What are you reading now?

A: Half-broke Horses by Jeannette Walls, Last Night in Twisted River by John Irving, Galore by Michael Crummey and Arnaldur Indridason’s Jar City.

Russell Wangersky was born in Connecticut but came to Halifax as a young child. He has worked as a journalist since the mid-80s, at the St. John’s Sunday Express, CBC Television, and finally, at The Telegram, where he became editor in 2002. For many years he also served as a volunteer fire-fighter. His book of short stories, The Hour of Bad Decisions, was included in both the Globe and Mail and Toronto Star’s lists of Best Books of 2006, and garnered an impressive string of awards nominations. Burning Down the House is his most recent book.

Tags: Creative Nonfiction, Interviews, Memoir

This entry was posted on Wednesday, November 4th, 2009 at 11:31 am and is filed under Awards, Creative Nonfiction, Essays, Interviews, Memoir. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.