Gail Anderson-Dargatz

BIO

Gail Anderson-Dargatz’s novels have been published worldwide in English and in many other languages. A RECIPE FOR BEES and THE CURE FOR DEATH BY LIGHTNING were international bestsellers, and were both short-listed for the prestigious Giller Prize in Canada. THE CURE FOR DEATH BY LIGHTNING won the UK’s Betty Trask Prize among other awards. A RHINESTONE BUTTON was a national bestseller in Canada and her first book, THE MISS HEREFORD STORIES, was short-listed for the Leacock Award for humour. She currently teaches fiction in the creative writing MFA program at the University of British Columbia. She and her husband, photographer Mitch Krupp, live in the Shuswap, the landscape found in so much of Gail's writing, including her upcoming novel Turtle Valley. For more information, visit her website at www.gailanderson-dargatz.ca.

INTERVIEW

February 18, 2000

Although you may not have heard of her yet, author Gail Anderson-Dargatz is not new to fiction writing, she's already a bestselling author in Canada and has been published in the UK. Now, luckily for us, we can enjoy her compassionate characters and poignant prose in her novel A RECIPE FOR BEES. This book backtracks through the life of main character Augusta and her family, as they struggle over land, love, and ultimately for life. TBR Senior Writer Jana Siciliano asks Dargatz about the autobiographical aspects of her novel, her intimate relationship with bees, her thoughts on marriage, love, and prejudice then and now in this telling interview.

TBR: Please explain, for those who aren't as familiar with your book, how closely related A RECIPE FOR BEES is to your actual life experiences?

GAD: While I wouldn't call this an autobiographical novel, I did draw heavily from the experiences of the people I love most (with their permission, of course). For example, Gabe is based on my husband Floyd, who is a beekeeper. My husband Floyd underwent brain surgery several years ago, after experiencing transcendent experiences that were very like a mystic's. I describe these experiences in the novel pretty much as they happened for Floyd. As it turned out he had a large tumor growing in his brain. Before the surgery he smelled wonderfully, powerfully sweet; following this surgery the sweet smell disappeared. Most women will understand the importance of smell in their personal relationships. On so many levels I had to get to know my husband all over again. I turned to books on widowhood to help me cope during his very long recovery (we're still working on recovery now). I'll note that I'm nothing like my very rigid "Joy" character, who is married to Gabe, at least I hope not.

TBR: How is the story of Karl and Augusta fashioned after your own parents?  And how did this book bring them back together after having been divorced for years?

GAD: My parents Eric and Irene are models for Karl and Augusta in many ways. I set out to show them how extraordinary their seemingly ordinary lives were. I even chose to give my characters some of the physical details that belong to my parents. For example, my father lost his right thumb to an accidental shooting while hunting. He still feels it after 70 years of living without it. My parents stayed together despite great hardship because, like so many others of their generation, there really was no choice. My mother did have an affair that produced me, and Eric did raise me as his own; although the circumstances in the novel, of course, were very different from what actually happened. My parents eventually divorced in the early 1980s, but stayed involved in each others' lives for many reasons, not to mention their five children, many grandchildren, and great-grandchildren. I interviewed them both for this novel, and showed them manuscripts as the novel progressed. They, in turn, began talking to each other about very old unresolved problems. My father, in particular, came to understand how isolating ranch life had been for my mother. Their romance rekindled, they eloped and got remarried just before Christmas a couple of years ago; some fifty years after their first marriage (they didn't want to tell us five girls or we would have orchestrated a big event). There were many reasons they came back together, but it was obviously very satisfying to be one of those reasons.

TBR: It seemed as if Augusta and Karl's hasty courtship and marriage occurred because of Augusta's mother's death. Do you think she would have married him if her mother hadn't died --- would she have waited for someone more suitable?

GAD: I don't know. Maybe. Things were very different during the times I was writing about. There simply weren't that many choices. Women of our generation forget that so easily. But more to the point: I don't consider the author to be the expert on their book. The reader is. The reason I say this is because I see the relationship between writer and reader as a participatory one. The writer sketches out a dream, but the reader fills that dream in, brings in her own experiences, tastes. That's why you'll get so much disagreement from readers (and reviewers) on the quality of a given book; it's not one book. In each reader's hands, it's a different book. If you doubt this, consider a book you might have read at age 20, then again at 30, 40, 50...the book appears to change dramatically, for better or worse. Of course, the book hasn't changed; we have. This is what makes the experience of reading so much more satisfying than watching a movie. At a movie, we're passive observers; when we read, we're involved in the act of creation.

TBR: Marrying Karl didn't work out quite as Augusta planned, especially when she had to move in with Karl and his embittered father who immediately showed an obvious contempt for her. Why did he dislike her? Was it because if her inherent strength?

GAD: Again, the reader is the expert here. What do you think? On the practical level, every book needs a villain.

TBR: What do you think Augusta felt was missing most in her marriage to Karl?  Was it love or sex that she was yearning for when she had other relationships with men besides Karl? Does she ever come to terms with their relationship?

GAD: Again, the reader is the expert. Why do people have affairs? Is it to fill longing? Of course. Is it biological? There seems to be plenty of evidence that we evolved both as monogamous and as adulterous creatures; both are pretty good methods for making a baby. On the other hand, both approaches have consequences, especially for women. Keep in mind that in the time I was writing about, women still weren't really considered sexual creatures, and often endured this indignity silently. In the novel, Karl learns a thing or two late in life. There's a wonderful scene where he seduces --- no, more than seduces --- cares for Augusta in the corn field. That's the moment at which their decades long love affair is rekindled. But this only comes after Augusta takes control of her life, namely, she finds economic power --- she starts her own honey producing business. With that power, she can wrestle other changes in her life. It has always been so in the lives of women.

TBR: You describe the finite and moving details of beekeeping in this novel. What do you think is the relationship between bees and humans? Bees seems to hold such a spell over their keepers --- what do humans learn from them?

GAD: Ah, bees! I chose to include beekeeping and honey production in this novel because it engages all five senses. There's the smell of honey and the hives, the wonderful sensuousness of being covered in honey while bottling it. One of my favorite memories is the day we took a wild colony of bees from my father-in-law's barn; they had built a hive inside the barn wall between the studs. The barn was coming down, and my husband Floyd wanted to capture the hive. Floyd called me over to the barn and had me put my ear and cheek to the barn wall. It was a sunny day. The wall was warm. I could smell the honey through the barn wall, but more than that I heard the bees buzzing on the other side of the board, felt the vibrations of them on my cheek. Floyd and I stood there for a long time, face to face, listening to them. All the beekeepers I interviewed for this book spoke lovingly of beekeeping, and chose poetic turns of phrase and metaphor. Beekeeping is beyond farming; it's an art form. As for what humans learn from them, the reader will draw their own conclusions, and that's as it should be.

TBR: Your book takes place in rural Canada and native Canadian Indians appear in the novel, for example, Augusta's train companion. There is talk of prejudice against the Indians as well --- what are your thoughts on the plight of the native Indian today? How has it changed from when Augusta and Karl were young, or has it?

GAD: The native community appears in the book because the native community is part of my larger community. The prejudice is still there and it's terrible, although throughout Canada native politicians, writers, actors, and artists are gaining a foothold and so are gaining a voice. Eden Robinson, a young writer I went to university with, is an example; her books are published worldwide, and as a consequence she has had to carry the heavy burden of being a representative of her people. At the time of my novel prejudice was more overt, and the terrible residential schools were running. On the other hand, the native and white communities, at least the farming communities, seemed at times to be more knitted then than they are now. For example, my mother would often come home from town and find a number of native women friends waiting in the kitchen, having already made coffee. An open home was the policy on both the reserve and, to a lesser degree, in the farm house. These women would simply stop in Mom's house on their walk to town, and make themselves at home. There is a lot of understandable anger in the native community now, and an uneasiness between whites and natives as both communities try to come to terms with a horrific history of prejudice and domination by the white mainstream community. This is a necessary phase; it will take many generations for native communities to rebuild themselves. Perhaps many more before relations between the groups are eased. But individuals break the tension. I grew up by the Shuswap reserve, dated native guys, still have friends living on the reserve. Change starts at that level, doesn't it?

TBR: Is your husband a reader? If so, does he read your work before anyone else?

GAD: Floyd is the first one to read my manuscripts, and he does give input, particularly when it comes to farm detail. He also has a good eye for inconsistencies in plot and timelines (this makes him a pain to watch a movie with). However his brain surgery left him with some language handicaps so I have other readers to turn to before I get to the editorial stage. Floyd does work full time with me, arranging interviews, and sometimes conducting them (especially if it's with some old farmer), keeping my office, hunting down research materials, arranging travel; and when I'm on the road for promotional tours, he simply takes care of me. My writer friends are green with envy.

TBR: What makes Joy so angry at the world, at her mother? Why did she choose to embrace Christianity when she is seemingly so void of compassion?

GAD: Again, the reader is the expert. I think we all know characters like Joy who are bound up in black and white thinking, unable to see past that into the complexities of human life, who run from complexities.

TBR: The photographs in the book are from your own family albums. What is it about them that inspired you to use them to illustrate this story?

GAD: I decided to use these photos to give another layer to the narrative. The photos gave a sense of this time better than I could. Many of them are quite wonderful, haunting; not at all like photos one usually finds in a photo album. And I guess I was simply driven by affection for these people. The photos are mostly of my mother and father. The last photo in the book was taken on the day of their engagement.

TBR: The idea of the family farm falling to the wayside in contemporary America is portrayed in your book. What do you think could be done about the problem?

GAD: It comes down to the consumer. As long as we are unwilling to question where our food comes from and what was done to it before we eat it, family farms will continue to disappear. If the consumer only buys what is cheapest, they are generally going to get food that is produced in large factory farms; farms that rely heavily on chemicals and often on underpaid labor. Farmers in Canada are in crisis now because they simply aren't getting paid for the work they do. The reasons for this are as complex as the global economy. On the individual level, the consumer can consider buying directly from small scale farmers. You are likely to get better quality food, and the satisfaction of knowing exactly what you are eating. To do this, check out farmer's markets. Ask who is growing the food and how. Some farmers sell direct. For example, as Floyd and I went to university, we had customers on campus. I delivered eggs to the philosophy department on my way to the creative writing department. We raised rabbit for local restaurants; and custom raised pork and chicken to the tastes of a couple, both instructors, who liked their pork fat and their chickens huge and couldn't find meat that way on the supermarket shelves. They knew exactly what they were getting, and exactly where it came from. In short, buy local. It's fresher and so it tastes better.

TBR: How did writing this book differ from your writing of your first book, THE CURE FOR DEATH BY LIGHTNING?

GAD: A RECIPE FOR BEES was a less difficult book to write. THE CURE often dealt with very difficult subject matter, and it was, after all, my first novel. I didn't feel the second novel jinx because I began A RECIPE FOR BEES while finishing THE CURE. In the same way I began my next novel project while finishing A RECIPE FOR BEES. There are simply times when I have to put one project to the side; I like to have another project waiting for those times.

TBR: What is your writing day like? Do you give yourself writing vacations?

GAD: I love to write. It is an obsession and I find myself writing when I'm doing other things. I write a great deal in my head. So if I'm out working in the garden, I'm often spinning a scene in my mind, words and all. Generally, when I'm in the writing phase, I work with Floyd on office work in the morning, take a break, and then work through the afternoon and into evening. I usually stop at 7 p.m. for supper, break for the evening, and then read up on whatever subject I'm working on for a couple of hours before bed. There are many phases to writing --- research, interviews, brainstorming, stewing, procrastination, dreaming, rewriting, rewriting, rewriting, editing, more interviews, more brainstorming --- that overlap throughout the writing of a novel. Some days are taken up with interviews or research. I try not to work on weekends, but rarely manage that. I try to take vacations, but end up writing. I can't seem to turn the writer off. For example, even when Floyd was in the hospital and so terribly sick, and I was distraught, my writer self was sitting on my shoulder smacking its lips over the great material. There's something deeply pathological about that, but every fiction writer I've met thinks this way. Likely we're all nuts.

TBR: Did you always want to be a writer?

GAD: Yes! My mother wrote; I have a big sister who used to write. It was just always there, even as I did other things. I began working as a writer, as a small town reporter, in my early twenties. Many people told me I was writing fiction then, too.

TBR: Who are your inspirations? Do you have Canadian authors you particularly look up to? Other authors?

GAD: There are so many writers who I consider influences. Margaret Lawrence and Alice Munro are big ones. My mentor was and continues to be West Coast writer Jack Hodgins. I love Toni Morrison's work. But I think my inspiration comes from the people and landscapes around me more than from other books. Reviewers have often seen South American influences in my work --- the ghosts and magic, I guess. But the ghosts, premonitions and magic came from family stories. For example, in A RECIPE FOR BEES, Augusta has a premonition of her father's death by drowning just after she has given birth to Joy. This premonition was one that my mother had, although it was her brother who drowned, a week after the premonition. I have recorded this story much as my mother told it to me. My father passed on the rich stories and legends about the region I grew up in, that he heard from the interior Salish natives he worked with, and I used these in THE CURE FOR DEATH BY LIGHTNING.

TBR: What book do you love so much you wish you had written it?

GAD: Oh, there are so many! Toni Morrison's BELOVED is one that comes to mind at the moment. It seems like every book I read influences me. I hope so.

TBR: How has success, if at all, changed the way you approach your work?

GAD: I can afford to write without worrying too much about finances. I can afford to write every day, full time, without working elsewhere. Floyd and I survived real poverty and near homelessness during his illness, so I can't begin to describe what this means to me. I pinch myself every day.

TBR: Can you tell us about your next project?

GAD: The next novel goes into edits at the end of this year. It will be published in Canada in the fall of 2001. It's a comic novel, about loss of faith, and it's been a hoot to write. It's set in Alberta, Texas and in Kenya.

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