Shooting the Bull
Just a reminder that our guest tonight on Shooting the Bull, 7:30 pm on WXDU 88.7, will be Lewis Shiner, whose new book, Black and White, is garnering excellent reviews. The novel is set in Durham, and tells the story of the construction of the Durham Freeway through the thriving Hayti neighborhood in the 1960s. This urban renewal project has come to symbolize the sorry state of race relations in our city, state, and country.
Lewis took some time out this week to answer a few questions. There are some spoilers ahead, so if you haven't read the book yet, and you don't want to know too much about it before you do, don't read any further.
Got a question you want to ask Lew about the book? Send an email to ShootingTheBull AT gmail DOT com.
DE: You grew up in Texas. Could you have written this novel had you not come here? I suspect the answer is no, and that's because people do think and talk about race differently in Durham than almost anywhere else in the country. But i'd like to hear your thoughts.
LS: No, I couldn't have written anything like this novel in Texas. People do think about race differently in Texas, and consider themselves superior to Southerners, though they are in many ways just as racist, if not worse. I don't know how special Durham is, because I haven't lived in any other cities with as large a percentage of African Americans. It would be interesting to compare it to, say, Philadelphia, which had similar urban renewal catastrophes. But I conceived this story here, and researched it here, and it grew organically out of this soil.
Another question . . . was why did Wilmington have a coup d'etat and Durham have largely peaceful coexistence? Frank cited the tobacco industry, but the longshoremen in Wilmington were equivalent, and gave the city its own black middle class, which led to a black newspaper, black elected officials, etc. One possible difference is that Durham remained more segregated--blacks stuck to "their place" in Hayti, for the most part, whereas my sense is that Wilmington was pretty well integrated, and that may have pushed the racists harder than they could stand. Tim Tyson might be able to answer that question.
DE: I think the book actually has three climaxes. First, when Michael learns who his mother (and grandfather) is. That's the emotional payoff. Then, when he disarms the bomb and captures Vaughan. That's the plot resolution. Finally, when he claims his identity in the very last sentence of the book. I'm not sure i know the words to describe that payoff. Can you talk about that structure both from a craftsman's perspective, and from a statesman's perspective? In other words, as a story teller, why did you write it that way? And as someone who, i think, is looking to bring about change, or at least to help create a condition in which change is possible, why did you write it that way?
LS: To me the three major climaxes were slightly different. The first is when Michael solves the murder mystery part of the book, who killed Barrett Howard, at the end of part three. The second is the climax of the suspense plot, at American Tobacco. And the third is the revelation of Ruth as the real villain of the piece when we read her letter almost at the very end. Those were the three strands as I originally visualized them--that's the craft aspect. I tried to play fair on the murder mystery, and follow all the rules of the whodunit, as I also followed most of the rules of the suspense novel--except the part where the hero exacts revenge, because that makes him not a hero to me. And the thing with Ruth is my bit of smoke for the end.
In terms of trying to bring about change, I think that is not so much a vector, moving from point A to point B, as it is the coloring that you apply to the black and white art in a comic book. I don't think you bring about change by argument. You bring about change when somebody walks a mile in the other fellow's shoes and sees he's been oversimplifying things. Or with the Naked Lunch moment that Burroughs talks about, when you realize that piece of meat on the end of your fork was once a feeling, living creature. It's when you look at the Other and realize the Other is you.
As to the structure, Raymond Chandler said, "Always save a bit of smoke to blow away at the end," or words to that effect. And I learned from my favorite police procedural writer, Barry Maitland, that there's nothing like a constant stream of revelations to keep a story moving forward. So I think the entire novel is plotted as one surprise after another (though how surprising they are, I can't promise you). Everything from major stuff like the discovery of the body to minor stuff like the aunt Michael never knew he had, or the sudden question of his birthdate, or Mitch Antree having committed suicide on THAT embankment. I tried to make sure there was one of those every few pages.
DE: The work that kept coming to mind while reading was Durrell's Alexandria Quartet (don't ask me why. i can't point to a specific incident, plot point, or character). You go a little bit into the multiple and shifting POV. I was wondering if there was another book here to be fleshed out. I'd love, for example, to read this story through Donald's eyes, or through Rachid's.
LS: I actually haven't read the Alexandria Quartet, though I've always meant to. In terms of literary models, I suppose I was picturing more those big modernist American novels from the 50s and 60s by people like James Jones--FROM HERE TO ETERNITY or SOME CAME RUNNING. I haven't actually read any of his books in decades, but it doesn't matter. That's what I read all through high school (along with Steinbeck) and it had a huge formative influence on me. What really matters is how I remember feeling when I read those books, not what I would think of them now.
I don't think there's anything left to write, if you're picturing a Durham Quartet. You know me better than that. I write one book and move on. If I did my job properly, you can reread the book and imagine how it looks to Donald as it unfolds, because I tried to make sure his story was coherent, and that all the stories were. As to viewpoint, however, I think there is only one POV in the book, and that is Michael's. He is the one putting those narratives together from the pieces he gets from Robert and Ruth. I pulled the same stunt in SAY GOODBYE--the first person narrator is actually telling the whole thing, even though he sometimes does so from Laurie's viewpoint. It's still filtered through his consciousness. (I kept that handy as an excuse if someone accused me of not being able to write convincingly from a woman's viewpoint.)
Lewis took some time out this week to answer a few questions. There are some spoilers ahead, so if you haven't read the book yet, and you don't want to know too much about it before you do, don't read any further.
Got a question you want to ask Lew about the book? Send an email to ShootingTheBull AT gmail DOT com.
DE: You grew up in Texas. Could you have written this novel had you not come here? I suspect the answer is no, and that's because people do think and talk about race differently in Durham than almost anywhere else in the country. But i'd like to hear your thoughts.
LS: No, I couldn't have written anything like this novel in Texas. People do think about race differently in Texas, and consider themselves superior to Southerners, though they are in many ways just as racist, if not worse. I don't know how special Durham is, because I haven't lived in any other cities with as large a percentage of African Americans. It would be interesting to compare it to, say, Philadelphia, which had similar urban renewal catastrophes. But I conceived this story here, and researched it here, and it grew organically out of this soil.
Another question . . . was why did Wilmington have a coup d'etat and Durham have largely peaceful coexistence? Frank cited the tobacco industry, but the longshoremen in Wilmington were equivalent, and gave the city its own black middle class, which led to a black newspaper, black elected officials, etc. One possible difference is that Durham remained more segregated--blacks stuck to "their place" in Hayti, for the most part, whereas my sense is that Wilmington was pretty well integrated, and that may have pushed the racists harder than they could stand. Tim Tyson might be able to answer that question.
DE: I think the book actually has three climaxes. First, when Michael learns who his mother (and grandfather) is. That's the emotional payoff. Then, when he disarms the bomb and captures Vaughan. That's the plot resolution. Finally, when he claims his identity in the very last sentence of the book. I'm not sure i know the words to describe that payoff. Can you talk about that structure both from a craftsman's perspective, and from a statesman's perspective? In other words, as a story teller, why did you write it that way? And as someone who, i think, is looking to bring about change, or at least to help create a condition in which change is possible, why did you write it that way?
LS: To me the three major climaxes were slightly different. The first is when Michael solves the murder mystery part of the book, who killed Barrett Howard, at the end of part three. The second is the climax of the suspense plot, at American Tobacco. And the third is the revelation of Ruth as the real villain of the piece when we read her letter almost at the very end. Those were the three strands as I originally visualized them--that's the craft aspect. I tried to play fair on the murder mystery, and follow all the rules of the whodunit, as I also followed most of the rules of the suspense novel--except the part where the hero exacts revenge, because that makes him not a hero to me. And the thing with Ruth is my bit of smoke for the end.
In terms of trying to bring about change, I think that is not so much a vector, moving from point A to point B, as it is the coloring that you apply to the black and white art in a comic book. I don't think you bring about change by argument. You bring about change when somebody walks a mile in the other fellow's shoes and sees he's been oversimplifying things. Or with the Naked Lunch moment that Burroughs talks about, when you realize that piece of meat on the end of your fork was once a feeling, living creature. It's when you look at the Other and realize the Other is you.
As to the structure, Raymond Chandler said, "Always save a bit of smoke to blow away at the end," or words to that effect. And I learned from my favorite police procedural writer, Barry Maitland, that there's nothing like a constant stream of revelations to keep a story moving forward. So I think the entire novel is plotted as one surprise after another (though how surprising they are, I can't promise you). Everything from major stuff like the discovery of the body to minor stuff like the aunt Michael never knew he had, or the sudden question of his birthdate, or Mitch Antree having committed suicide on THAT embankment. I tried to make sure there was one of those every few pages.
DE: The work that kept coming to mind while reading was Durrell's Alexandria Quartet (don't ask me why. i can't point to a specific incident, plot point, or character). You go a little bit into the multiple and shifting POV. I was wondering if there was another book here to be fleshed out. I'd love, for example, to read this story through Donald's eyes, or through Rachid's.
LS: I actually haven't read the Alexandria Quartet, though I've always meant to. In terms of literary models, I suppose I was picturing more those big modernist American novels from the 50s and 60s by people like James Jones--FROM HERE TO ETERNITY or SOME CAME RUNNING. I haven't actually read any of his books in decades, but it doesn't matter. That's what I read all through high school (along with Steinbeck) and it had a huge formative influence on me. What really matters is how I remember feeling when I read those books, not what I would think of them now.
I don't think there's anything left to write, if you're picturing a Durham Quartet. You know me better than that. I write one book and move on. If I did my job properly, you can reread the book and imagine how it looks to Donald as it unfolds, because I tried to make sure his story was coherent, and that all the stories were. As to viewpoint, however, I think there is only one POV in the book, and that is Michael's. He is the one putting those narratives together from the pieces he gets from Robert and Ruth. I pulled the same stunt in SAY GOODBYE--the first person narrator is actually telling the whole thing, even though he sometimes does so from Laurie's viewpoint. It's still filtered through his consciousness. (I kept that handy as an excuse if someone accused me of not being able to write convincingly from a woman's viewpoint.)
Labels: books, Durham, race relations, radio
Since 1949, Durhamites have slept soundly, secure in the knowledge that, in our town, erection can be depended upon. Now, thanks to the power of the internets, we can spread that security all over the world.
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