Monday, January 02, 2006
New Steven Erikson Interview
Here is the interview everyone has been waiting for!Smile
Enjoy!
Dear Mr. Erikson, Let me start by thanking you for being gracious enough to take some precious time off your indubitably busy schedule to answer these questions. But with the imminent release of THE BONEHUNTERS, know that your fans are extremely excited about this chance to hear from you in person.
- Is there a character that you particularly enjoy/enjoyed writing? Why is that? By the same token, is there a character that you absolutely don't like writing about? For what reason?
For me it's important that I enjoy the characters I write about, or rather, those whose points of view I am using. I need there to be something intrinsically interesting in them. Often it's nothing obvious, either. In real life, people don't tell you what their character is -- it's revealed, in increments, through what they say and what they do. In that sense, character is subtle, and I certainly try to make it so in my fiction. So, I'll have either a full history of the character I am using, or just its bones if that person is 'new' to the series. By bones I mean there's a sense of their history, but not all the details are fleshed out -- that comes as I write them at the first draft stage -- so I try to start with the same feel of mystery that exists with every new person each of us meets in real life. Anyway, I don't not like writing about any characters, even the despicable ones. As for favourites, again it's a subtle thing with me, as each character delivers something different. For Karsa Orlong, for example, it's his barrelling through things, both verbally and physically, and often in ways that undermine the cliches regards 'barbarians' or, even more pleasing (for me), undermines the genre's conventions. On a quieter side, I did enjoy writing both Apsalar and Scillara in The Bonehunters: that they are thematic opposites with romantic ties to one character in particular only makes it more fascinating.
I'll never pound anyone over the head with characterisation -- turns out there's some of my readers who'd rather I did just that. Oh well.
- What do you feel is your strength as a writer/storyteller?
Yikes. Setting things up then doing the unexpected, I suppose. With well-buried motivations among many of the major players in the series, I think I can continue to surprise readers. There's a few of those instances in The Bonehunters, including what I'll call an inverted double-bind stick-the-knife-in reversal thing (think the phrase will catch on?), that's clearly set up one way only to ... well, don't want to give too much away here.
Years ago, when I was learning the craft of fiction at university workshops in Victoria and Iowa, I observed a peculiar aversion to certain elements of narrative fiction; principally, plot and drama. Neither, it seemed, belonged in serious literature. This was the era of kitchen-sink stories and Carver wannabes. Plot was for genre; better the characters did nothing and talked a lot but talked about nothing while doing it, all of which was supposed to lead to some profound epiphany but mostly led to blank looks from others in the class. As for drama, well, drama was out. This was also the time of the ascendancy of the Cynical School of Fiction. Wherein we were taught that true drama doesn't exist, and any attempt at drama in fiction was in fact /melodrama/. In other words, because the world was the way it was, and fiction was its truest reflection, there was no such thing as 'earned emotion' -- nothing hard and heavy in fiction was in fact honest. Why? Because it was hard and heavy, of course. So there I was, quietly railing against such notions and writing 'serious' fiction that had people actually doing things and had things actually happen and they were often hard and heavy and the response was as you'd expect. The only loud kudos came when I wrote flat out comedy, probably because my comedy was of a cynical, sarcastic nature. Only what I was laughing at was not always what everyone else was laughing at.
One might say I fell into genre writing in order to use both plot and drama, and there might be some truth in that. It's hard to be analytical about such things. After all, I love reading Homer and Homer's full of drama. Nasty, brutal drama. It may also be a case of wrong place, wrong time. Which is probably the most likely, so I'll stop now.
- What author makes you shake your head in admiration?
Lots and lots. John Gardner, Gustav Hasford, Mark Helprin, Atwood (no, just kidding on the last one. I shake my head all right, just not in admiration), some Doris Lessing. In fantasy, I think Robin Hobb is a very clever, very subtle writer. Alas, I'm not reading much fantasy these days, although I enoyed Tim Lebbon's new one and I'm very interesting in how reviewers will take David Keck's first novel..
- Prior to its American release, Tor Books allowed you to take care of a number of inconsistencies found within GARDENS OF THE MOON. Are there any plans to do the same with the UK version?
None of which I am aware. There weren't many -- one big gender correction, though -- but the rest was pretty minor.
- Now that many purists and aficionados consider you one of the best fantasy authors in the world, is there added pressure when it comes down to writing a new addition to the series?
If there's pressure, it's to do with time management -- the edit of The Bonehunters especially involved a lot of back and forth, given its length -- which meant I had to drop everything else at that time. Some other manuscripts needed some editing as well, then TOR sent me on a signing/reading junket down the US West Coast which while fun took five days out of my writing schedule. That kinda pressure, sure.
The other kind, dealing with the expectations of readers, the answer is no, not at all. The thing's mapped out so I know what I'm doing (I hope that simply relieves your readers rather than coming across as boastful -- really, I do know what I'm doing!) and I can see the light at the tunnel's end. As mentioned earlier, I'm fairly certain I will surprise readers with future events, with enough twists and turns to keep them reading.
- What would you say was the hardest part of the entire process involved in the writing of the Tales of the Malazan Book of the Fallen? Each new addition reveals yet more depth to a series which has shown just how rich and complex it truly is. What was the spark that generated the idea which drove you to write the series in the first place?
The first question: the hardest part was twofold. One was finding a publisher. The second was convincing myself that writing the series really has been as easy as it has seemed and continues to seem -- I mean, it should be hard, right? The plot-lines and arcs are so folded and interwoven you could make a trampoline out of them strong enough to handle a plummeting bus. And yet it all arrives, timely and satisfying (to me) with nary a wayward step. It feels uncanny, Patrick. I wasn't drawn to halt once in the entire writing of Midnight Tides, for example. Not even a half-hour's pause. At times I felt like a spectator to the whole creation process. Pretty much the same for The Bonehunters and now Reaper's Gale. It just flows. Scary.
The second question: oh the sparks were all negative things, frustrations at the genre's confounding predictability. Wanting to write something in fantasy I myself would like to read (and not just me, but Cam as well -- the one reader who stays in my head as I write). Wanting to kick the tropes around, wanting to get rid of that endless quasi-medieval class-conscious blueblood crap. Wanting a fantasy world as multicultural as this one (the preponderance of white-skinned heroes and blonde princesses ... man, what century is this?). Wanting a fantasy world with a history beyond the Dark Lord of three hundred years ago who's found a rock that will help him rise again and do, oh, bad things; a world with geology and geography, etc.
Sure, there's some good stuff out there, but it wasn't enough. Maybe still isn't.
- If you could go back in time, what advice would you give the younger Steven Erikson concerning his writing career?
Find the secret potion that would de-complicate Gardens of the Moon. It must exist. Problem was/is, I don't see anything confusing in it. Wish I could, wish I did. The world was as full for me then as it is now -- and to write a history the way I wanted to, well, I still haven't got an answer. Poor young Steven Erikson -- sorry, mate, you're on your own.
- Is a World Fantasy Award something you covet?
Not really. It'd be nice, eventually, but I don't toss and turn at night chewing on it. Having been a judge ... well, never mind that -- the system does not really allow for books in a series (barring the > first one). It would be nice to see a special category for series, though.
- What's the progress report pertaining to REAPER'S GALE? Is it likely that the book will be released a year following THE BONEHUNTERS?
From my own standpoint, progress is just fine. The first half of a novel (for me) always takes longer than the second half. It's where everything is set up, after all. The second half is the pay-off -- which means more action (drama?), which is always quicker to