Charlotte Wood: ‘It was like I had acid poured on my whole life … but in a good way’
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2023-10-06
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"The writing friends said, 'Take a walk,'" says Charlotte Wood. “Whatever it is or whatever you're trying to figure out in the book. It works Your mind can just wander.” Most mornings we find the author walking a loop through the gentle hillsides and restored wetlands of Sydney park. “I think they did a great job,” she told me. “It was basically old, toxic soil.” But while Wood emphasizes the importance of staying close to nature, his walks have little to do with the park itself. They fall somewhere between routine and ritual, a buffer to personal order as the world draws closer. Charlotte Wood 'I hope what I do is turn that sadness into something bearable by shaping it and combining it with other things.' It's a September afternoon when we meet at Wood's house in the city's inner west. During our short walk towards park, we chat with the sounds of birds, light traffic, children finishing school, and our footsteps on concrete. Posters and painted signs are hanging from windows and fences urging people to vote yes. Wood's steps were quick and easy, but his voice was a little broken with anxiety. "There's a real feeling right now If the referendum fails, what are we left with?" The narrator of her new novel is a woman in political retreat who grapples with her own “vision of failure” to effect change. Stone Yard Devotion is Wood's tenth book, which is more personal than his previous works. “As I get older, I become less and less sure about how to do the right thing,” she says. “I understand the appeal of running away.” She pauses to hear the familiar hum of a plane taking off or approaching. “To be honest, I find it very easy to despair… But I don't want to despair in my work.” “Sometimes you read literary fiction that kind of bludgeons you about how messed up the world is, and I don't want to write that way. The transformation happens when we try to turn it into art; not just by writing and presenting sadness in the world on page. “Hopefully what I'm doing is making that sadness bearable by somehow shaping it and combining it with other things.” We reach old brick chimneys that form the northwestern entrance of park. As the road noise fades behind us, it looks like something has decided to open up. “I got cancer last year,” he tells me. “And both of my sisters got cancer at the same time. "Everyone's fine," he added hastily. Old smoke stacks in a Sydney park. The disease killed both Wood's parents before he turned 30; These losses, as Wood has previously noted, have sharply divided the world into those who matter and those who don't. "I thought I knew that," he said sarcastically. We all know this, but most of the time we act like we don't. "It was as if acid had been spilled throughout my life and only the important things were left." One these key elements is Wood's awareness of the physical, which underlies all his fiction. “We are much more of our bodies than we acknowledge,”
"The writing friends said, 'Take a walk,'" says Charlotte Wood. “Whatever it is or whatever you're trying to figure out in the book. It works Your mind can just wander.” Most mornings we find the author walking a loop through the gentle hillsides and restored wetlands of Sydney park. “I think they did a great job,” she told me. “It was basically old, toxic soil.” But while Wood emphasizes the importance of staying close to nature, his walks have little to do with the park itself. They fall somewhere between routine and ritual, a buffer to personal order as the world draws closer. Charlotte Wood 'I hope what I do is turn that sadness into something bearable by shaping it and combining it with other things.' It's a September afternoon when we meet at Wood's house in the city's inner west. During our short walk towards park, we chat with the sounds of birds, light traffic, children finishing school, and our footsteps on concrete. Posters and painted signs are hanging from windows and fences urging people to vote yes. Wood's steps were quick and easy, but his voice was a little broken with anxiety. "There's a real feeling right now If the referendum fails, what are we left with?" The narrator of her new novel is a woman in political retreat who grapples with her own “vision of failure” to effect change. Stone Yard Devotion is Wood's tenth book, which is more personal than his previous works. “As I get older, I become less and less sure about how to do the right thing,” she says. “I understand the appeal of running away.” She pauses to hear the familiar hum of a plane taking off or approaching. “To be honest, I find it very easy to despair… But I don't want to despair in my work.” “Sometimes you read literary fiction that kind of bludgeons you about how messed up the world is, and I don't want to write that way. The transformation happens when we try to turn it into art; not just by writing and presenting sadness in the world on page. “Hopefully what I'm doing is making that sadness bearable by somehow shaping it and combining it with other things.” We reach old brick chimneys that form the northwestern entrance of park. As the road noise fades behind us, it looks like something has decided to open up. “I got cancer last year,” he tells me. “And both of my sisters got cancer at the same time. "Everyone's fine," he added hastily. Old smoke stacks in a Sydney park. The disease killed both Wood's parents before he turned 30; These losses, as Wood has previously noted, have sharply divided the world into those who matter and those who don't. "I thought I knew that," he said sarcastically. We all know this, but most of the time we act like we don't. "It was as if acid had been spilled throughout my life and only the important things were left." One these key elements is Wood's awareness of the physical, which underlies all his fiction. “We are much more of our bodies than we acknowledge,”
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