INTERVIEW WITH MORRIS GLEITZMAN, Sydney Taylor Honor Award Winner

THEN by Morris Gleitzman recently won a Sydney Taylor Honor Award in the Teen Reader category. 

Today, I have the joy of  interviewing Morris Gleitzman as part of the Sydney Taylor Book Award blog tour.  Chatting with him about the writing of THEN has been pure pleasure. Feel free to eavesdrop!

Author, Morris Gleitzman

Morris, while reading THEN, I had this feeling that you were right there inhabiting the heart and mind of 10 year old Felix.  Is writing this age an at-home/automatic thing for you?  Can you talk about how you decided on Felix's age and how it feels to write from the 10 year old perspective?

The main characters in all my books are 10 or 11 years old. It’s not a choice and I don’t question or analyse this – it’s just the way it is. So I can’t really answer the last part of your question because I’ve never known it any other way. I am however glad to find that people of that age are usually free from the distractions of the hormonal surge that comes a little later, and so are able to focus entirely on their wonderfully expanding personal moral landscape.

I loved Felix' optimism.  Even in the midst of one of history's most horrendous times he believed in solutions and went after them.  I assume that, in your research, you uncovered stories of real children with great spirit and stamina.  In what ways did kids from history inspire you? Any stories you want to share?

My approach with fiction is to imagine experiences in certain contexts. These Felix stories are partly about how we use our imaginations to sustain ourselves in tough times – the power of stories to keep optimism alive when rational analysis invites despair. I particularly wanted to explore how the telling of such stories can be an act of love rather than foolish delusion. Naturally I did a huge amount of research before and during the writing of these books. Including immersion in the words of many young people who lived and died in those terrible times. There were many examples of optimism and many of despair. I’d prefer not to cite examples of the former because I don’t want to imply that the latter is a less admirable or praiseworthy response.

You know those one sentence summaries authors have to create for their books?  Have you done this for the series, ONCE, THEN, NOW, and AFTER?  I know you prefer not to call them Holocaust stories. How do you briefly describe the series?

Stories that explore the power of love and friendship in the midst of the most unfriendly human behaviour.

Your research has taken you into some dark places and of course that pain is what makes your stories so powerful. Your character helps the reader to bear the pain just by being so darn funny.  But while you're immersed in that world, how do you mitigate the pain you put yourself through?

Not very successfully. I experienced shingles while writing ONCE, and what the doctors described as a minor stroke while writing AFTER. Happily neither has left me with any long-term problems. Apart from my body acting out, my primary pain-mitigating technique is to focus on the fact that, despite these stories’ terrible context of loss and suffering, I’m writing about love.

And did you know when you wrote ONCE that there would be a sequel? When did you have the "series" figured out?  And do you expect more volumes in addition to NOW, and AFTER?

I thought ONCE would be it. Later, when I realised I needed to write THEN, and I realised what would happen at the end of that book, I knew I would want to go on to explore how that experience affected Felix’s whole life. Hence NOW. AFTER is the result of wanting to explore another important emotional area of Felix’s childhood. I have no firm plans for a fifth book, but I’m thinking about one that would follow on from NOW, to bring Felix’s life full-circle.

Well, that makes my heart skip a beat!  Thanks so much, Morris for taking time to chat and especially for making time to write. Congratulations on yet another literary honor!

Blog reader, you can hear Morris' thoughts on awards and other writing topics in this YouTube clip.  For my reflections on THEN, see my previous post.

I should confess to you that THEN is the only Morris Gleitzman book I've read.  But this, my friends, is a situation I'm about to remedy.  The books, ONCE, THEN, NOW and AFTER all belong on my shelf.  

And as for Gleitzman's shelf of published books,  - have a look and you'll see that I've some catching up to do!  

The Sydney Taylor Blog Tour continues all week with this schedule.  All aboard!

THEN by Morris Gleitzman

On Tuesday, I'll be chatting with Australian, author Morris Gleitzman who won a Sydney Taylor Honor Award for  THEN .

The Australian cover (left) with American version (right)

THEN is a book about surviving the worst of times.  It starts out running - literally.  The first sentence is:

  

Then we ran for our lives, me and Zelda, up a hill as fast as we could.

Which wasn't very fast.

But the pace of this story is fast.  Ten year-old Felix yanks us into his life and drags us through the horror. And we follow because we care.

THEN is a sequel to ONCE but the story stands on its own and Felix tells us immediately where ONCE left off.  

You know how when you and two friends jump off a train that's going to a Nazi death camp and you nearly knock yourself unconscious but you manage not to and your glasses don't even get broken but your friend Chaya isn't so lucky and she gets killed so you bury her under some ferns and wildflowers, which takes a lot of strength, and you haven't got much energy left for running and climbing?

Well, no.  Actually I have no idea what this is like. But never mind; Felix makes me forget that. 

That's how it is now for me and Zelda.

He takes me right into his ten-year old soul where I witness the horrors of Nazi domination and still almost believe in a good outcome.  His optimism gets me through.

At first the story feels surrealistic because I'm not used to facing bullets and running from Nazi's with the comical approach that the author uses. But truly this place (Poland) in this time (1941) was surrealistic. The humor, which largely grows out of Felix' innocence and storytelling style, helps us to confront the reality of a "unreal" situation.

I won't recap the story.  Just know that Felix at age 10 takes on the care of 6 year-old Zelda whose survival methods sometimes conflict with his.  Felix is a storyteller and his stories give Zelda courage to take each next step. The children meet good people along the way. And conflicted ones.  And evil.

If you've got to introduce kids to the Holocaust (and YES you must) then Felix is a trustworthy, delightful narrator.  You will laugh out loud and cry deep inside. But Felix and his stories will see you through.  

Morris Gleitzman is a masterful storyteller and his words are way more powerful than mine so stop by on Tuesday to hear directly from him.  See you then!