12 or 20 (second series) questions with Angela Antle

Angela Antle is the 2025 Rachel Carson Writer in Residence atGermany’s LMU, an artist and former CBC producer, documentary-maker, host and producer of the podcast GYRE, an interdisciplinary PhD candidate (MemorialUniversity) and a member of Norway’s (NMBU) EmpoweredFutures: A Global Research School Navigating the Social and EnvironmentalControversies of Low-Carbon Energy Transitions. Her research intersectsclimate communications and justice, disinformation, petrocultures, politicalrhetoric and energy futures.Her first novel The Saltbox Olive ispublished by Breakwater Books.

1 -How did your first book change your life? How does your most recent workcompare to your previous? How does it feel different?
That remains to be seen.The Saltbox Olive is my first novel. I can only compare it to how I felt as anew mother: joy, relief, worry, excitement, and extreme vulnerability.

2 -How did you come to fiction first, as opposed to, say, poetry or non-fiction?
I’ve had a long career as ajournalist - writing scripts and documentaries for CBC. That was my trainingground - I learned to really listen to what people say and to be faithful totheir words and intent when quoting. When I took my first creative writingclass with Lisa Moore, I was petrified, until I felt the crackle of energy thatcomes from writing back and forth over the invisible line between truth andfiction.

3 -How long does it take to start any particular writing project? Does yourwriting initially come quickly, or is it a slow process? Do first drafts appearlooking close to their final shape, or does your work come out of copiousnotes?
I’m pretty slow, but I’mwriting things all the time in my phone, in various paper journals (I have asort-of system) and on my laptop. Some days it’s an article for theIndependent.ca aboutEnergy Futures, some days it’s academic writing (I’m doing an interdisciplinaryPhD in energy humanities and I’m interested in climate disinformation andspeculation). Although I find both those worlds extremely generative forfiction writing - it can be hard to make the switch to fiction writing. Ascheesy as it may sound, if I’m having trouble, I use the pomodoro method; setmy timer for 20 minutes and write without stopping, that can usually move theinternal lever from non-fiction to fiction. Walking also helps.

4 -Where does a work of prose usually begin for you? Are you an author of shortpieces that end up combining into a larger project, or are you working on a"book" from the very beginning?
I write a ton of short pieces,sometimes it’s just dialogue or quirky things people have whispered to me. It’slike quilting. I have a Scrivener file that holds all those scraps and I goback to it often to rework the pieces and darn them onto other pieces to turnthem into something longer. 

Although, when I started TheSaltbox Olive, it was always going to be a novel, one that I’ve wanted to writefor a long time, but I had no idea how to do that. I was fortunate to have thesupport of Trudy Morgan Cole through the WritersNL Mentorship program. Thathelped me get started. I just kept writing and writing until I arrived atcharacters and a structure that felt authentic and meaningful.

5 -Are public readings part of or counter to your creative process? Are you thesort of writer who enjoys doing readings?
I’m a big believer in thepower of readings to foster community, but I haven’t read The Saltbox Oliveyet! I’m in Germany on a fellowship and just this week received a physicalcopy. There is talk in the farmhouse I share with the other researchers, thatthere’ll be cake and a reading this week which will be nice. The first officialreading will be at Writers at Woody Point this summer - I’ve been a co-hostthere for over a decade and I’ll be interviewed by my friend and former CBCcolleague Shelagh Rogers and it will be like reading to family.

6 -Do you have any theoretical concerns behind your writing? What kinds ofquestions are you trying to answer with your work? What do you even think thecurrent questions are? 
All my work: art, journalism,research, and fiction is eco-critical and explores how language can maskinjustice, manipulate, disempower, as well as set the stage for the future. Inshort, I’m interested in the abuse of power - a topic that will (unfortunately)always be in vogue. I try to illuminate that in my work and give readers achance to get closer to a more embodied kind of truth.

7 –What do you see the current role of the writer being in larger culture? Do theyeven have one? What do you think the role of the writer should be?
To challenge stasis andconnect readers with the world’s injustices and beauty. 

8 -Do you find the process of working with an outside editor difficult oressential (or both)? 
Essential. 

9 -What is the best piece of advice you've heard (not necessarily given to youdirectly)? 
Put your characters in peril. 

10 -How easy has it been for you to move between genres (fiction to journalism tofilmmaking)? What do you see as the appeal?
I don’t know about easy, butmoving between genres can be quite generative, when I’m writing journalism, Iget ideas for research and fiction and vice versa and I hope that it all makesme a better thinker and writer. 

11 -What kind of writing routine do you tend to keep, or do you even have one? Howdoes a typical day (for you) begin?
I sit up in bed and start. IfI can’t shake off the sleepiness, I get a coffee and get back in bed and keepwriting. At some point in the day, I’ll be embarrassed that I’m still in myPJs; get dressed, and migrate to my desk. 

12 -When your writing gets stalled, where do you turn or return for (for lack of abetter word) inspiration?
I draw or paint or garden,look at art, and read about it - that always loosens the cogs. When The SaltboxOlive stalled, I looked at WW2 photos from the Imperial War Museum’s digitalcollection, they have 11 million images! I think that’s where I discovered thework of South African photographer Constance Stuart Larrabee upon whom I basedthe character Barbara Kerr.

13 -What fragrance reminds you of home? 
Blackcurrants. 

14 -David W. McFadden once said that books come from books, but are there any otherforms that influence your work, whether nature, music, science or visual art? 
l studied a lot of archivalmilitary maps and used Google maps to explore parts of Italy where the men ofthe 166th fought and lived; that’s how I put together the puzzle of where theywere at different points in the war - a spacial timeline - I mostly stayed trueto; you can’t exactly make up a new date for the Battle of Cassino! I also usedthat timeline to create an itinerary for a 166th research trip that I took withmy husband in 2018. 

The other medium thatinfluenced the characters was audio. Through the MUN folklore archive, I wasable to listen to a 1940s  radio show Calling Newfoundland that aired tapedmessages from the men while they were overseas. Hearing the gentle hesitationin their voices helped me write Arch, Slade and Tom (Tombstone) in contrast tothe hero soldier archetype we often read or see via American media.

15 -What other writers or writings are important for your work, or simply your lifeoutside of your work? 
All the generous, creative,and collaborative writers in Newfoundland, as well as philosophers TimothyMorton and Rosi Braidotti…and the brilliant Naomi Klein.

16 -What would you like to do that you haven't yet done? 
Farm. In Emilia-Romagna. 

17 -If you could pick any other occupation to attempt, what would it be? Or,alternately, what do you think you would have ended up doing had you not been awriter? 
See above. 

18 -What made you write, as opposed to doing something else? 
Reading Death on the Ice, River Thieves, and February. 

19 -What was the last great book you read? What was the last great film? 
I absolutely love Ali Smith’s writing and am reading the last of her seasonal quartet of novels. Truth betold, I’m not actually finishing, but sleeping alongside the book, and puttingoff reading the last chapter, because it’s so wonderful, I don’t want it toend.

As for film, I loved ChristianSparkes’ Sweetland - the adaptationof Michael Crummey’s novel. 

20 -What are you currently working on? 
I’m writinga speculative podcast script about a post-oil future on a North Americanarchipelago. It’s called Hag Islands and it’s part of my PhD project. I do hopeto turn it into a novel. 

12 or 20 (second series) questions;