JAMES STRECKER: If you were asked for 50 words for an encyclopedia to summarize what you do, or have done, in the arts, what would you say?
JILL DOWNIE: Jill Downie writes in many genres: fiction, non-fiction, plays, film scripts. Her most recent incarnation is as a mystery writer of contemporary thrillers, and she has started a new series set in the Gilded Age and the Belle Epoque.
JS: What important beliefs do you express in or through your work?
JD: Although I mostly write light fiction, clearly my work is a reflection of who I am and what I believe. The values I want to express through my writing are those good old-fashioned virtues of tolerance and acceptance that, sadly, only recently have included marginalised groups such as the LGBT communities. Appropriation of voice is a contentious issue for writers today, but I hope to make my writing not too white, too straight, or too narrow.
JS: Name two people, living or dead, whom you admire a great deal and tell us why for each one.
JD: So many people I admire for different reasons, but I’ll choose one man and one woman, and I’m going to limit myself to the creative world. Charles Dickens. What a story teller! He used the pain of a difficult childhood to throw light on the miseries and suffering of his age, creating a world of unforgettable characters, both good and evil. My father told me that his father – who had worked in the London slums — kept a complete set of Dickens by his favorite armchair all his life, because Dickens had opened the eyes of so many of his contemporaries to a world around them many chose not to see. Of course, we know now that Dickens was a less than admirable man in his personal world, and it was kept well hidden when he was alive, but I’ll stick with my choice. Jane Austen and Alice Munro. Brilliant, beautiful, illuminating writing, working on small canvasses, creating the universal out of the particular. Two vastly different writers, living in different eras, but they illustrate the marvel of fiction in their similarities and their individuality.
JS: How have you changed since you began to do creative work?
JD: I have been writing ever since I was a child, so maybe my writing has evolved as I have. Impossible to separate the two.
JS: What are your biggest challenges as a creative person?
JD: The biggest challenge is twofold: deciding where to concentrate my creative efforts, because I enjoy writing in so many genres, and the challenge we all face – time!
JS: Please describe at least one major turning point in your life.
JD: One of the earliest pieces of work I had published was a short story entitled You can get here from there, and I have developed a talk with that theme, called Getting from There to Here: a Writer’s Roadmap. The random quality of life, the twists and turns of the journey, many out of one’s control, intrigue me. For me, the major turning point was coming to Canada – not my decision, but crucial to my personal life, and my development as a writer. Much of what I write is rooted in my pre-Canada past, but Canada made me after an unsettled, peripatetic childhood.
JS: What are the hardest things for an outsider to understand about what you do?
JD: I think one of the hardest things for an outsider to understand is just how damn hard it is, sometimes, to sit yourself down and get started. And how amazing it is when it all starts to happen!
JS: How and why did you begin to do creative work in the first place?
JD: As I said in an earlier answer, I have been writing since I was a child. It is an inescapable compulsion, and even rejection does not cure the affliction.
JS: What haven’t you attempted as yet that you would like to do and please tell us why?
JD: This is difficult to answer, because I have had the good fortune to write and be published in so many genres. I have seen my plays performed in various venues, but I would love to see a full-length play of mine on one of the major stages in this country.
JS: What are your most meaningful achievements?
JD: Creatively, I feel my major achievement is keeping going!
JS: What advice would you give a young person who would like to do what you do?
JD: My advice to any young person who wants to lead a creative life, in whatever discipline, is to be brave, have courage and steam ahead. Learn from the rejections, but don’t be discouraged. When you look back, it won’t be the risks you took that you regret, but the chances you didn’t take. Fortunately, writing is a moveable feast, so it will fit around whatever other career you have that gives you some financial stability.
JS: Of what value are critics?
JD: The value of the critic depends on the value of the critic. That sounds crazy, but there are reviewers who add to the experience of reader or viewer, or listener. They are not grinding an axe, or settling scores, or wishing the artist had written, or drawn, or composed something entirely different. They are the best, and their judgement is of value because it comes from their love and knowledge of the art form they cover.
JS: What do you ask of your audience?
JD: What I ask of my audience is to come on this journey with me.
JS: What specifically would you change about what goes on in the world and the arts?
JD: I would like a greater recognition in the world of the importance of all art forms to human happiness and fulfillment. That sounds very airy-fairy, but sadly it usually means something very concrete: money.
JS: If you could relive one experience from your creative life, what would it be and why would you do so?
JD: There are so many! I loved the time I spent in the Yukon, researching the life of Faith Fenton, the Canadian journalist who covered the great gold rush for the Globe newspaper. And I wouldn’t mind once again having coffee and port at Chatsworth with the late Duke of Devonshire and his wife, Deborah, one of the redoubtable and controversial Mitford sisters, served by a valet in white gloves, and talking about the arts and Canadian politics – about which the duke was very well-informed.
JS: Tell us what it feels like to be a figure who is presented somehow in the media. What effect does this presence have on you?
JD: It takes some getting used to being presented, interviewed, photographed. What always interests me is how the interviewer approaches you. They show their own individuality and personality when they are dealing with yours. I am also asked to interview other writers, and I enjoy that very much. It is refreshing to have the spotlight on the other person, and not oneself.
JS: Name two places you would like to visit, one you haven’t been to and one to experience again and briefly tell us why
JD: I would love to return to the place of my birth, and in which I lived until I was nearly eight years old – to revisit Georgetown, in what was then British Guiana, to walk again along the sea wall where I used to play in the afternoons, and visit the manatees in the beautiful botanical gardens. My second choice would not be to a country I don’t know and have never visited, but one I know fairly well. My love affair with France began in my student years, when I had the great good fortune to study in Paris at the Sorbonne. But I have never been to Grasse, a mediaeval town in southern Provence, and that is on my wish list. Jasmine, lavender, gardenia, myrtle, wild mimosa and, above all, the May rose, the heart of many fragrances, grow there, in the perfume capital of the world. Walking into the Galeries Lafayette when first in Paris as a student, it is the fragrance in the air I remember above all, not the clothes. Magic.
JS: Please tell us about one or more projects that you have been working on, are preparing, or have recently completed. Why do they matter to you and why should they matter to us?
JD: I am working on the new Gilded Age, Belle Epoque series. The first book is completed, and I am writing the second. I am also reworking a play based on the likelihood that Shaw’s Eliza Doolittle is based on my grandmother, Rose, who knew him well.
JS: Let’s talk about the state of the arts in today’s society, including the forms in which you work. What specifically gives you hope and what specifically do you find depressing?
JD: I would prefer not to use the word “depress,” but what worries me is the effect of social media on the arts generally. But I truly believe that the power of storytelling will always win over whatever new hazard is placed in the way of the storyteller. Above all, nothing will stop the compulsion of creative people to do what gives them joy. What we have to watch out for – besides the shrinking of grants, funds etc. – is the attempt to silence free speech. And that is where social media plays a positive role, because it is shines a light on dark places – so it too must be protected, and not silenced.
JS: Finally, what do you yourself find to be the most intriguing and/or surprising thing about you?
JD: I think the aspect of me that would surprise most people who know me is that I am, essentially, a loner. I have been an actress, and love performing, or speaking, or “being someone else.” Which takes me back to a previous question. Is it me I present as a figure in the media, or is it “someone else”?