Stuff
Interview with Samantha Bruce-Benjamin
Interview with Samantha Bruce-Benjamin
Interview with Samantha Bruce-Benjamin
A Conversation with Author Samantha Bruce-Benjamin, Author of The Art of Devotion
1. What inspired you to write your first novel? You’ve worked for the BBC and as an editor; have you always been a writer at heart?
I would say that I was always passionate about literature. For me, it’s all about the book. Obviously, my background in the editorial field fueled that interest, yet the desire to write emerged only after several years working in that environment, perhaps because the nature of the job requires writing “on demand” to a certain degree. Working so closely on promotional materials, as all editors do, gave me the confidence to try to write something for myself. So I took a year to attempt to come up with something: I wrote two pages a day for five months, and at the end of that period I had a first draft of The Art of Devotion.
2. Where did you come up with the idea for this story in particular? The character development is fantastic—are any of the characters based on real people?
I can’t speak for all authors, but it is a general truism that those who desire to write are often counseled to write only “what they know.” Of course, there is a little of what I know in this novel. I, like many writers, delve into a world of memory to find inspiration, and I am lucky in that the memories I have amassed are peopled by such exquisite souls. Yet, for me, the pleasure of reading has always derived from being able to project my own imagination into the life of a story—envisaging people I know as the characters, creating their world as I see it based on what the author suggests. As a consequence, I wouldn’t dream of imposing the facts of the inspiration of this book onto any reader. The book belongs to whomever reads it, to interpret as they wish, so that it becomes “their” story, personal and unique to them and founded on their insights and experiences.
3. The novel has some very surprising twists. Did you have the ending planned when you began writing, or did the character’s relationships develop as you wrote?
In essence, the novel crystallized in my imagination when I accepted that Adora would die at the end of the summer in 1938—and, most importantly, that she wanted to. As soon as the choice became “hers,” everything else—the nature of the betrayal, the history with Sebastian, her relationship with Jack—formulated in my mind and a clear trajectory from start to finish emerged.
4. You’ve set your novel in paradise. Have you visited the Mediterranean islands for inspiration?
Until I was twenty-one, I spent all of my summers on an island in the Mediterranean Sea.
5. Did you have a “favorite” character in this novel? Was there one you related to more than others?
I pity Genevieve—in fact, she haunts me. I wrestle with Sophie, still unsure whether to forgive her. I grudgingly acknowledge Miranda’s strength. Yet, ultimately, Adora is always with me. Curiously enough, I have no idea where she came from. Who she is—her motivation and passion—never fails to take me by surprise, as her personality is revealed throughout the novel. Truthfully, she took on a life of her own, and it is a life that still fascinates me to the point that, even as I reread her, I am still trying to make sense of who she is and why she proves so compelling. Even so, she never fails to break my heart.
6. Which point of view was easiest to write? Which was the hardest?
Miranda proved the easiest voice to write. Yet, contradictorily, she also proved the hardest in that I found it literally devastating to write her “final” speech. Originally, I had thought to grace Miranda with a rather poignant, almost redemptive, closing scene, but it occurred to me as I sat down to the task that the very last thing Miranda would be, in reality, was sorry. Something about this awareness just felled me—it was like being punched in the stomach. As much as I didn’t want to—and maybe this is because, in some ways, Miranda is my “offspring”—I accepted that she had to be judged. I could not intervene as an author to try to “save” her or offer up a reprieve. It was up to readers to decide how they perceived her conduct. I didn’t change a word from the first draft to the last: I knew exactly what Miranda would say, how she would justify her actions, the delight she would take in her circumstances, and, although this scene took only five minutes to write, hours later I was still deeply affected by my decision. Yet I also recognized that everything about the story had led up to that moment; it was the twist the novel required, the bitter rub from which there was no escape: a dark interpretation of devotion—the art of malice, if you will.
7. What writers have you been inspired by? What were you reading while writing this novel? What are you reading now?
For inspiration, F. Scott Fitzgerald, Edith Wharton, T. S. Eliot, Virginia Woolf, Kazuo Ishiguro, Louis de Bernières, Françoise Sagan, Émile Zola, François Mauriac, John Cheever, Graham Greene, Ian McEwan, Ian Rankin, Evelyn Waugh—the list is endless. I couldn’t read at all while I was writing the novel. I started several books, yet I found that I couldn’t concentrate on them and, even more counter–productively, I began to compare my writing—unfavorably—to those authors and found that I stalled creatively. As a consequence, I stop reading altogether whenever I am writing, as I find it extremely difficult to have another voice in my head, beyond the “voices” I need to find for the characters.
<< Previous Interview
1. What inspired you to write your first novel? You’ve worked for the BBC and as an editor; have you always been a writer at heart?
I would say that I was always passionate about literature. For me, it’s all about the book. Obviously, my background in the editorial field fueled that interest, yet the desire to write emerged only after several years working in that environment, perhaps because the nature of the job requires writing “on demand” to a certain degree. Working so closely on promotional materials, as all editors do, gave me the confidence to try to write something for myself. So I took a year to attempt to come up with something: I wrote two pages a day for five months, and at the end of that period I had a first draft of The Art of Devotion.
2. Where did you come up with the idea for this story in particular? The character development is fantastic—are any of the characters based on real people?
I can’t speak for all authors, but it is a general truism that those who desire to write are often counseled to write only “what they know.” Of course, there is a little of what I know in this novel. I, like many writers, delve into a world of memory to find inspiration, and I am lucky in that the memories I have amassed are peopled by such exquisite souls. Yet, for me, the pleasure of reading has always derived from being able to project my own imagination into the life of a story—envisaging people I know as the characters, creating their world as I see it based on what the author suggests. As a consequence, I wouldn’t dream of imposing the facts of the inspiration of this book onto any reader. The book belongs to whomever reads it, to interpret as they wish, so that it becomes “their” story, personal and unique to them and founded on their insights and experiences.
3. The novel has some very surprising twists. Did you have the ending planned when you began writing, or did the character’s relationships develop as you wrote?
In essence, the novel crystallized in my imagination when I accepted that Adora would die at the end of the summer in 1938—and, most importantly, that she wanted to. As soon as the choice became “hers,” everything else—the nature of the betrayal, the history with Sebastian, her relationship with Jack—formulated in my mind and a clear trajectory from start to finish emerged.
4. You’ve set your novel in paradise. Have you visited the Mediterranean islands for inspiration?
Until I was twenty-one, I spent all of my summers on an island in the Mediterranean Sea.
5. Did you have a “favorite” character in this novel? Was there one you related to more than others?
I pity Genevieve—in fact, she haunts me. I wrestle with Sophie, still unsure whether to forgive her. I grudgingly acknowledge Miranda’s strength. Yet, ultimately, Adora is always with me. Curiously enough, I have no idea where she came from. Who she is—her motivation and passion—never fails to take me by surprise, as her personality is revealed throughout the novel. Truthfully, she took on a life of her own, and it is a life that still fascinates me to the point that, even as I reread her, I am still trying to make sense of who she is and why she proves so compelling. Even so, she never fails to break my heart.
6. Which point of view was easiest to write? Which was the hardest?
Miranda proved the easiest voice to write. Yet, contradictorily, she also proved the hardest in that I found it literally devastating to write her “final” speech. Originally, I had thought to grace Miranda with a rather poignant, almost redemptive, closing scene, but it occurred to me as I sat down to the task that the very last thing Miranda would be, in reality, was sorry. Something about this awareness just felled me—it was like being punched in the stomach. As much as I didn’t want to—and maybe this is because, in some ways, Miranda is my “offspring”—I accepted that she had to be judged. I could not intervene as an author to try to “save” her or offer up a reprieve. It was up to readers to decide how they perceived her conduct. I didn’t change a word from the first draft to the last: I knew exactly what Miranda would say, how she would justify her actions, the delight she would take in her circumstances, and, although this scene took only five minutes to write, hours later I was still deeply affected by my decision. Yet I also recognized that everything about the story had led up to that moment; it was the twist the novel required, the bitter rub from which there was no escape: a dark interpretation of devotion—the art of malice, if you will.
7. What writers have you been inspired by? What were you reading while writing this novel? What are you reading now?
For inspiration, F. Scott Fitzgerald, Edith Wharton, T. S. Eliot, Virginia Woolf, Kazuo Ishiguro, Louis de Bernières, Françoise Sagan, Émile Zola, François Mauriac, John Cheever, Graham Greene, Ian McEwan, Ian Rankin, Evelyn Waugh—the list is endless. I couldn’t read at all while I was writing the novel. I started several books, yet I found that I couldn’t concentrate on them and, even more counter–productively, I began to compare my writing—unfavorably—to those authors and found that I stalled creatively. As a consequence, I stop reading altogether whenever I am writing, as I find it extremely difficult to have another voice in my head, beyond the “voices” I need to find for the characters.
