Interview with Susanna Sonnenberg
The Southeast Review Online, Spring 2008
Michiko Kakutani of The New York Times said of Susanna Sonnenberg‘s memoir: “Writing in sharp, crystalline prose, Ms. Sonnenberg… plung(es) readers into a sort of perpetual present tense in which we are made to experience, almost firsthand, the inexplicable and perverse behavior of an impossible woman from the point of view of her aghast, bedazzled—and immensely gifted—daughter.” In this interview, she talks candidly about the difficult process of crafting this startling memoir.
Q: You mention in the preface “(t)his is… subject to the imperfections of memory.” I think that the relationship between writing and memory is a dynamic, fluid process. So, I’m interested in what happened as you wrote this memoir… did your recollection of the events evolve or shift due to the act of committing them to paper?
Art gives you control. That’s part of why we make art, I think, so that we can hold and shape and come to terms with something that has had control over us.
Q: Do you feel that you are now, indeed, in control of the events? And by taking control—by writing this memoir—do you feel healed?
Sure, I could control what was on the page to some extent. But in order to get there I had to go into the false sense of control over events that I thought I had, break that open, accept total lack of control, and then choose how I wanted to deal with it. I know that all sounds kind of vague, but that’s the best way I can describe the process. It was one of acceptance, and in that, typically, a person releases control. So I did that and at the same time became more controlled as a writer, more in command of my material, as I wanted to use it.
Q: As you wrote, did the story become more real to you, or did it help create some distance from the events?
The story became more real and also more of a story; a fixed thing that did provide some distance. Both happened. But many of the episodes in the book existed as fragments or feelings in my memory, and writing forced me to focus them and make them palpable, see what was real in them and make the reader see that reality to.
Q: Did writing the memoir help you better understand the events of your life and how they shaped you and your relationships? In creating a unified narrative, did you also manage to create a unified vision of these certain aspects of your life?
Unified narrative is so compelling to me, the story we tell to others about who we are. The way we tell our own story, the details we choose. If anything, what I understood better was how critical it was to me to have built a strong and steady relationship with a partner—with someone who saw me and heard me. As I wrote out my childhood, I marveled that this had even been possible, and I still don’t know how it was, but it was. It was very painful to examine some of my parents’ behavior and to accept it. I think I had always managed to put distance between me and it, to minimize it.
Q: You mention that it was critical to you to be with “someone who saw me and heard me.” In regards to your relationship with your mother, was a feeling of invisibility something you struggled with? Is the memoir an attempt to claim your own space, to be seen and heard?
I think artists work largely to make their voices heard. For some, that surely is born out of a sense of not being heard or seen. My mother was such a dazzling and central figure that I felt often invisible, unless some of that dazzle spilled onto me, but then I was who she wanted me to be, not a real self.
Q: Your father is largely absent from the narrative. Was that a decision
you had to make as a writer—to focus on the relationship with your
mother?
It’s important, I think, to remember as you read any memoir, that this is one particular story the writer is telling. It cannot be all the stories. I chose to leave out the story of me and my father because this was to be a book about women, about female sexuality, and about my mother. He was not as central, of course, to my life as she was. I lived with her. But he played a large role. It just wasn’t where I wanted my reader’s attention.
Q: How did you conduct research for this book? For example, in the chapter “Why I Went to Boarding School,” you use excerpts from your diaries. So, I’m wondering what materials—beyond your own memories—you had at your disposal. Did you interview friends and family members? Or did you rely only on your own recollections?
I emphatically did no research. I was interested in the way memories lodge inside us and become the stories of ourselves, the story of self. Whether or not something happened exactly this way, the memory has an authority of its own, and that’s what we carry around with us, what makes us who we are. I wanted to capture that. With the exception of a couple of dates verified by, say, my parents’ divorce agreement, I stuck to memory, the voice of the self. Because this was never going to be an accounting, a report, or even an explanation. It was to be an interior landscape.
I wrote the first draft without looking at the diaries. Then I read them, and the experience was terrible. Often, memory had softened and smoothed things over, made events more palatable, protecting me from pain, I think. The diaries were so raw and naked. I guess you could say I interviewed the 12-year-old me, the teenaged me. I had a couple of brief conversations with old friends, asking them how they had perceived my relationship with my mother at the times I had known them. Those were helpful in getting me to see outside myself.
Q: At several points in the memoir, you question or doubt your memory. When you were writing this book, were there times when you were unsure of your memories? Were you ever sifting through alternate versions of memories?
I believe that ANY memory is an alternate version, to use your term. Our memories appear at different angles, depending on when we’re remembering them, how old we are, how recent they are, how many times we’ve told them, if we’ve never told them. Why is it that you can be SURE you were 5 when something happened, then you realize you were in fifth grade? Does that invalidate you, the rememberer, or does it reflect the shifting nature of memory? It’s so complicated, so layered. Then, as we tell our memories we constantly shape and prune them. I was intrigued by how difficult it was to work with straight memory—no documentation, no interviews. Because it constantly jumped around! You ask if I was unsure of the memories. I would think I was sure, then I’d start to remember, and then the details would seem completely insane, and test my confidence, and then I’d really have to concentrate.
Q: I’m curious about the structure of the narrative. Some of the chapters feel like they could stand alone as essays. How did you put the book together? And when you began writing it, what did you have in mind in regards to form?
I conceived the book as a series of discrete pieces that could be read together. While I was writing, though, I realized that without linking things and explaining some things in a more linear fashion, the reader would be lost or confused. At a certain point in writing any book, you take the reader into account, and then the book becomes theirs too, not just yours.
Q: In the chapter “Cherry Girl” you mention that at 27, you began a novel about your mother. Was that novel a starting point for Her Last Death?
I have worked with this material, as a writer, for my whole life. Trying to make sense of things. Trying to see them from different angles. I have always been drawn to themes of identity, secrecy, lying, and sexual power. Those themes were all important in my novel, but I lacked the maturity and understanding to frame events in a meaningful way. I have forgotten the novel to a large degree, and I didn’t look at it while writing the memoir.
Q: Can you comment on the exterior landscape and how it functions in the memoir?
This is a very interior memoir. There are few scenes set outdoors, in a way that reflects the outdoors. I wanted to capture the almost suffocating sense of focus I felt on my mother and our relationship. Once the narrative moves to Montana, nature gets a little more mention—it’s such an essential element of Montana—but I still didn’t interact with it very much. I’ve probably written the only book set in Montana that isn’t interested in the natural landscape! That’s not to say I’m not interested, but this story of breaking free of my mother did not include nature.
Q: In moving to Montana—in creating distance from New York City, where so many of the events of the memoir occur—was a psychological distance from the events created? If so, was this a necessary distance that enabled you to tell your story?
I left New York in 1993 and started this book in 2005. Did 12 years have to pass? Yes, they did. That’s how long it took to build a full, complete, and authentic life in Montana, a place where I gave birth to my children, developed intense new bonds with friends, came to see and value the natural landscape and feel its importance to me, found really good therapists. But really, it was years before I stopped missing New York and the New York part of me. The psychological distance came from moving fully into a life I had made for myself and casting off the trappings of a life so influenced by others.
Q: You mention at the end of the book that “New York streets weren’t home to me anymore.” What is your concept of home? Is your concept of home different today than it was in the past?
I don’t remember ever feeling at home as a child or young woman. I was literally always moving, hunting for the right spot. My concept of home now is reflected in the final scene of the book: a tight, joyful circle with my husband and children. I am surrounded by people who make me whole, who feed me. That’s home.
Q: You say “writing was crucial to my life.” How was it crucial?
Writing helped me make sense of things, and it even placed a bookmark on things I couldn’t understand or make sense of yet. That’s the most basic answer. Then, also, the recognition was important to my sense of self, to understanding my identity. I was a writer. I worked with words, made things that way.
Q: What can you tell me about your writing process?
I like to let my mind be as loose as possible. For instance, first thing in the morning—no coffee, no conversation. Just start. Later, in a more rational state, I edit or rewrite. Of course, with a family, that’s not possible most of the time, so I had to adapt. I like to be very alone. I like silence. I put everything down that comes to mind and examine it later. I move around a lot—pacing, talking out loud, gesturing—to put myself into a scene, or even into a thought. I’m pretty tapped out by 1 or 2, and then it’s good to have activities and concerns that have absolutely nothing to do with my writing. I often find ideas or structure comes to me while I’m taking a walk, taking the dog out, whatever. I have to let my mind let go.
Q: Were there times when you felt you couldn’t bear to continue writing this? Were there times you ran up against some avoidance or resistance to working with the material?
I grew terribly depressed while writing the book. Sometimes I’d walk around in a state of shock, numb. I hated that I’d opened a door I couldn’t now close. My children provided a wonderful counterpoint to the material, keeping me in the present, keeping my heart going.
Q: How has your family reacted to the publication and success of your memoir?
I am not in touch with my mother or sister. The rest of my family has been supportive, and I think they understand the importance of perspective in telling one’s story.
Q: What are you reading now?
Books about Alaska—Ordinary Wolves by Seth Kantner, Blonde Indian, an amazing memoir by Ernestine Hayes. I couldn’t read any memoirs while I was writing, so now I’m enjoying them. Foreskin’s Lament by Shalon Auslander, Please Excuse My Daughter by Julie Klam. The Commoner by John Burnham Schwartz. The Narnia books with the boys. I keep trying to read Frances Hodgeson Burnett’s A Little Princess to them, but I think it’s just too girlie, and with dead or absent parents, they get a little freaked out.
The following can be answered in a word, a phrase, a sentence . . .
Q: Name a writer who is currently making you jealous.
Helen Simpson.
Q: What kind of child were you?
Precocious, sombre, adult.
Q: What is your relationship with rejection like?
A brief flash of embarrassment, followed by getting on with things.
Q: What book did you suffer for the most, and why?
I endured a lot of lonely depression, working on the memoir, revisiting episodes that felt normal as a child but looked ghastly from my adult perspective.
Q: What was the greatest surprise for you in your most recent writing?
That readers question the credibility. But that’s their prerogative.
Q: What writerly habit would you most like to break?
Excessive line editing before I’ve put the whole thing together.
Q: What did you have for lunch today?
I always forget to eat lunch.