Leda Schubert * Writer of Picture Books

Mar 30, 2011 6:17 AM EDT

I love the interview. Great questions.
Laura
laura.leahj@gmail dot com

- Laura

Mar 30, 2011 7:39 AM EDT

This is a fantastic interview. I really try to make it a point to send a card or letter to my friends and family every once in awhile. I remember as a child how excited I was to receive something in the mail.

What about love letters? What do people hold on to these days? Do they print out an email to stuff under their pillow and read at night?

- Teresa

Mar 30, 2011 7:45 AM EDT

"Email is the downfall of letter-writing, blogging is the downfall of diaries. All the “primary source materials” now look alike! It seems to me supremely optimistic that any of the words tapped out online will be accessible in two or three hundred years."

Isn't that the truth? The upside, however, is that people who would otherwise be isolated are now members of thriving online communities. I'm thinking of young mother stuck at home. I wish I had been blogging when the kids were babies and I was going out of my mind.

- Jennifer O.

Mar 30, 2011 1:07 PM EDT

i wish so much that zigging and zagging chart of connections had been included in the book. more than anything i hope there will be a volume 2, and 3,4 and 5. maybe the publisher will see the light and the endpapers will be of the author's design.

- martha s.

Mar 30, 2011 2:30 PM EDT

I too would love to read more volumes about Scribbling women. There are several women who were great letter writers and whose stories would be interesting.

- Marya

Mar 30, 2011 2:34 PM EDT

Thanks for stopping by, everyone! I agree about the zigzags. Maybe Marthe can put them up on her website!

- Leda Schubert

Mar 30, 2011 8:18 PM EDT

I say, go for it, Marthe. If you have more women to write about, I am sure there is some intelligent and interested out there waiting! I would love to see your next list.

- Sal's Fiction Addiction

Mar 31, 2011 10:56 AM EDT

Love the interview, you pulled out some wonderful insights into the writing process.

I too started making connections between the women as I read the book. It would be fun to see Marthe's "zig-zags."

As for online writing, I guess we could all get paper copies of our blogs published. In my case it would lose some dimension because I like to include a lot of links.

- Roberta, Wrapped In Foil Blog

Apr 01, 2011 3:36 AM EDT

My sister and I have made it a point that this year we send at least one postcard a week to someone, anyone. It makes us happy and are almost sure it makes the recipiant smile.

- Heather

Apr 03, 2011 4:35 PM EDT

Ah lists! I LOVE making lists. Actually, I used to keep a notebook with me when I travelled. If I were sitting down in a coffee shop or waiting for a bus or taxi, I would jot things down. Quirky thoughts about the culture I was in or the things happening around me. I still find those tidbits inspiring when I re-read what I've written...

- Christinabean

May 04, 2011 4:35 PM EDT

I enjoyed the interview and definitely will look for Scribbling Women in the library or bookstore. Leda, your question to Marthe about whom she'd like to dine with, and also the scope of the book, brought to mind The Dinner Party by Judy Chicago, which anyone who is curious can see here. http://www.brooklynmuseum.org/exhibitions/dinner_party/

- Deborah Kops

Mar 21, 2011 11:57 AM EDT

I suspect many published memoirs are in good part fictoirs as the authors misremembered, embellished, exaggerated, revised, or otherwise fictionalized their past. The author Bruce Chatwin famously ignored distinctions between fact and fiction, and all of his "nonfiction" travel books have fictional elements, including some of the characters. Parts of Annie Dillard's "Pilgrim at Tinker Creek" were also fictionalized -- she's never been one to let the truth get in the way of a good story. I think it's a fine thing to do as long as you're open and upfront about it, although some writers argue that they have no duty to inform their readers whether there's any truth to what they're reading, and some even argue that the moment you put pen to paper you're by definition creating an altered account of reality, since you're describing events and people and places through your particular viewpoint and your psychological filters.

- Brad

Mar 21, 2011 1:57 PM EDT

Memory is highly over rated, anyway. There are many things I would not mind forgetting. Memoirs are also highly over rated. I like fictoir just fine!

- kelly

Mar 21, 2011 4:20 PM EDT

I think most people remember tiny nuggets from their childhood and then add layers of action, dialogue, setting and character according to other nuggets of memory lodged in their brains, i.e., the house they lived in, a family pet. Who knows how much of it happened the way they tell it?

- Sarah Sullivan

Mar 22, 2011 4:08 AM EDT

What about smells, or particular people - can you remember those? Try standing outside the front door of the first/only house you lived in, knock on the door, and enter - wending your way through the rooms. There has to be a way to capture some of those elusive memories, Leda. Very interesting. If nothing works, write a novel about a girl with no memory. You know how that feels.

- Stephanie Greene

Mar 22, 2011 4:35 AM EDT

Thanks for your comments, everyone. Food for thought. Brad, I certainly agree that most "memories" are altered perceptions of reality. Kelly, I do think there are some wonderful memoirs out there, however fictionalized they might be. Sarah--yup. Stephanie, these are useful suggestions. I'm not sure I've done the best job of describing my memory gaps, but, on the other hand, I seem to be leading a pretty functional life.

- Leda Schubert

Mar 23, 2011 4:09 AM EDT

I have the same problem, Leda. Robert Olen Butler's FROM WHERE YOU DREAM saved me. He said that for writers, literal memory goes into an internal composter of sensations and emotions and then gets reprocessed into our writing. The literal memories would get in the way. After reading this I worried a tiny bit less.

- Dana Walrath