Jo’s Comments (group member since Jan 12, 2016)

Jo’s comments from the Our Shared Shelf group.

ASHLEY: I have never heard someone say self-esteem is a white-person invention. When you talk about that in the book, it sounds like you're saying self-esteem does not exist in Native American culture. Self-esteem is defined by the dictionary as "a realistic respect for or favorable impression of oneself; self-respect," so I find it hard to see how it could be absent from a culture. Can you explain this more - how self-esteem is a white-person invention and how does not exist in Native American culture?

TM: In my culture, in my family, we weren't taught to consider the self as a singular thing. We didn't talk about "a self," we spoke in first person plural at most gatherings, even at celebrations honoring one person's achievements. We see the self as connected to the land and the ancestors who were stewards of the land. The self is numerous. To esteem that would deal with a language I've never heard in a hospital or therapist's office. There were never any conversations growing up about self-esteem. When I became a woman I would hear therapists tell me to value myself. They talked about redemption in terms of value (the way one might redeem the value of a coupon). I could never think of the self in those terms, as something that could be tallied or quantified. The first and only times I've heard people talk to me about esteem, it was within white spaces, not home with my elders or my family. The language of "value," "worth," and "redemption" make me suspicious. I don't want to quantify myself, or qualify myself in those terms. I use terms like "self-love" instead, because love is boundless and impossible to quantify.

PAM: Do indigenous writers deal with the white gaze and if so, what was the most challenging aspect of it? Did you feel that you held back?

TM: I think all writers want to create work that speaks to a universal truth or experience. I think it means sometimes my work has to explain certain practices or ideas in a way that's accessible to the outside audience, and I don't mind doing that. It doesn't feel restrictive to exact my experiences so that anyone who wants to do the work of trying to understand has access. I want to connect to people from different communities. Giving things up to readers isn't necessarily kowtowing to white culture, because even people from my own nation need a little context and explanation. I think white people would know if I was spoon-feeding them things, so I just jumped right in.

DAGNY: bell hooks talk about how love is a verb, not a feeling. How love is what we do and what is done it us. What is love to you? Has the definition changed through the healing process/the process of writing Heart Berries, and if so, how/why?

TM: Love dragged me down a bit. I felt hurt by my will to love people. Now, it's something better. I'm striving every day to give and receive the right kinds of love. James Baldwin has a line about love I read often:

“Love takes off the masks that we fear we cannot live without and know we cannot live within. I use the word "love" here not merely in the personal sense but as a state of being, or a state of grace - not in the infantile American sense of being made happy but in the tough and universal sense of quest and daring and growth.” ― James Baldwin, The Fire Next Time

Hi Everyone,
Exclusive for Our Shared Shelf! OSS author and legend, Roxane Gay, interviews Terese Marie Mailhot, who answers our member questions about Heart Berries!!
Please read below...

Enjoy!
The OSS Team


Roxane Gay: What has the release of Heart Berries been like? What are the best and worst parts of having such a buzzed about book out in the world?

Terese Mailhot: I’ve been working so hard. It feels like an accomplishment—like finishing a degree, or publishing work, or doing something for the right reasons. It feels good as hell. The best parts of a critical success is that I wrote the book according to my own artistic integrity, and people came my way—so, I believe in myself more. I care about my instincts and desires more. It probably shouldn’t work that way, but it feels validating to see people reading my book.

There are a few worst parts of having a book with buzz. The stakes are higher—which is good and bad. What I do matters more now. People want more from me now. Sometimes I read things about myself I don’t like, and I’m always considering what’s worth addressing.

I just want to keep writing. I want to keep working. I have a broader scope now, and I’m smart enough to keep my precision. My career is just that, a career. When before it was just me being an adjunct, getting rejected quite a bit. So, I can’t just sit back and enjoy anything just yet. I have other work to do and I need to do it now, like always.

RG: Do you enjoy touring?

TM: I do until I don’t. I loved being in bookstores and reading. I loved reading at the Community Bookstore in Brooklyn, and I loved being with Indigenous students at Stanford, and I love the Pacific Northwest. I stayed in a Four Seasons for the first time, and my brother and I just kind of marveled at the TV in the bathroom. I sound like a yokel, but for real. It’s just an amazing thing to travel and see things I wouldn’t have otherwise seen. It’s an amazing thing to do interviews for writing something.

And then my kids need me and I have work at Purdue and IAIA. I also have to write. I have learned how to write on planes, and in hotels, and Counterpoint is really good about organizing my life, but the kid thing and the two other jobs thing—I can’t drop any balls, so it can feel impossible on a bad day.

RG: There are many raw, vulnerable moments in Heart Berries. What does it take to write from the self with such intimacy?

TM: The whole book was the hardest thing to write. I think it takes ruthlessness, and then tenderness in revision. People say that I’m hard on myself. I just look at myself often, because I want to be my best self: on the page, to my kids, and to myself. Writing about failure is important to me. Writing about loss is one way I’ve found out who I am. When I was writing to Casey in a hospital it was all angry, and one-sided, and malicious, and then I saw it on the page and I considered, if this was fiction would I buy it? No. I wouldn’t buy the narrator was being truthful with herself if she was appearing so judgmental and angry. So, I asked myself what the work was really about—and, yeah, it was about Casey, sure. It was also about the fact that I didn’t need a man and trying to validate myself through men wasn’t going to work anymore, and maybe what I needed was my conviction, my voice, and love, on my terms. I am able to write fuller about my true self when I am viewing it through the eyes I use to edit fiction. I ask myself questions, like, is there a scene from my life I can bring in to contextualize this thesis statement or narrative occasion. I look at myself on the page like this. In real time: when I have a reaction, or emotion, and it feels wrong at first, I ask myself what it’s really about. It’s made me a better person, speaker, and writer. This type of interrogation of self might not be healthy, but from my background, living how I lived, I had to be hypervigilant of everything I said and did, so that just bleeds into my work. Even when I appear undone, it’s because I’ve allowed myself the grace of undoing—consciously or not. Sometimes my body has given me breaks or failures my mind hasn’t willed yet. Sometimes it’s the opposite.

RG: How do you define your artistic integrity?

TM: I had an idea of what would make people pleased with me, and then I did what I thought would please me, artistically and personally. That changes and shifts, but the integrity of that determination remains. I’m writing what I want, and trying to do it as well as I possibly can. Heart Berries couldn’t be rendered another way and I respected that, and I had to write it. I wrote it with the knowledge that I might be ruining a career that didn’t exist yet, because maybe people would read it and think, this is uneducated, or undone, or it’s moving away from established ideas on memoir that are purposeful and more important than this work.

I know I always want to say the thing. I’ve marked that as part of an aesthetic—always say the thing. That sounds silly, maybe. It does, but it’s what I keep in mind. Sometimes it’s the most brutal thing, or the darkest thing, or the secret, or, it’s the thing I have to say a thousand times before the real thing comes. That’s a process for me—it renders the truth.


RG: How do you resist writing simply what would make people pleased with you? And what kinds of things make people pleased with you?

TM: I’m not writing not to please them, but I want to come into my own story in a way that interests me. I guess I’d like to be unexpected.

I know that I’m not writing within the conventions I was taught, concerning nonfiction. People wanted something linear, a story that could be conveyed with more detail, less ambiguity, and they wanted to remove the sexuality. I was concerned with an emotional and artistic truth over a linear account of what happened. I did more than let the narrative be fragmented. I tried to construct a full experience of fragmentation and memory retrieval, where the experience of writing it felt compelling to me. I wanted to push myself forward in form and idea—which I think means, whenever I found myself constructing something predictable, and easy to convey, I troubled it a bit.

In this book it was important to express what it was to be me. Losing Isadore, or raising Isaiah, only gained significance or weight if the interiority of myself was existing on the page, which meant I had to be personally engaged, and unconcerned with the expectations people were placing on me. In fiction it’s important to create an experience for the reader, and illustrate something to the reader, and with nonfiction, since it’s personal—you have to consider the self in a way that seems different. You have to construct a self for the reader, and determine how much you want to give. I wanted to give a lot, which meant a lot of risk. So often, I would show people who I was, and it was too much. I had to let the work be too much of the things I feared.

RG: What is some of the work that you need to do, now?

TM: I just wrote an essay about nudity for you. That sounds funny. I thought it was important to write about nudity and Indigenous identity right now, because I’ve seen a lot of pushback against our sexualities on Twitter. I felt provoked to acknowledge that nudity and sexuality is not a problem to fix within Indigenous communities. Native women’s bodies are being policed, even by our own people, and I just can’t understand the shaming.

I need to write my second book, which I really thought I had a handle on yesterday, but today, I feel uncertain. So, today I just bought a TV. That was something, and it will inform my second book. I just know it will.

RG: Do you ever feel restricted by the label of "indigenous woman writer"?

TM: Yes. Especially when I see publications always marking Indigenous writers this way. There is a publication that celebrates the same three Indigenous writers like a cycle, and I saw myself in an article recently there, and I thought, man, I don't want to be in that cycle. I want to be part of a larger writing community, because I think I learn more when my circle is larger. I don't want to feel burdened with the expectation I will do what other Native writers are doing. I am Indigenous, and a writer, but depending on how I see the term being used, sometimes I resent it.

RG:What advice do you have for other indigenous writers or writers of color, who find themselves being forced into that cycle by the literary community?

TM: My advice would be that they should handle it how they want. I was built to argue, I think. I like arguing. I can take up challenging people, and that's how I combat wrongful compartmentalization. I don't like being reduced. I like fighting for my work.

RG: What was the last great book you read?

TM: The last great book I read. It was an audiobook of Future Home of the Living God by Louise Erdrich.

RG: What do you like most about your writing?

TM: I like my determination to get a line right. I like that it will take me years to convey the right thing about a certain person. I have never committed to anything else in this way, besides parenting—not a job, or a man, or a bank, or a diet.


Some Our Shared Shelf readers also had questions for Terese:

MARZIE: I wanted to ask Therese if she’s felt any pushback from Native Americans/First Nations community for her frank discussions about depression, substance abuse, and involvement in family services situations? I also wanted to say that this is one of the most poignant books I’ve read in a long time.

TM: Thanks, Marzie. I have felt pushback, but it's mostly my own projections and insecurities about revealing so much about my path to wellness and self-actualization. People have noted the danger in my visibility as an author, and people want positive and uplifting portrayals of Indigenous people. I really can't afford to acknowledge the pressure to be without fault. I've heard more good things than bad concerning my ability to acknowledge my mental health issues. I think it empowers people to see that they're not alone, and so many people battle with depression and dysfunction. I feel ultimately good about discussing those things in a public space.

ERIN: What advice do you have for aspiring indigenous writers? What is the biggest hurdle you had to overcome to get where you are today?

TM: My advice is that there's room in the world for our work. The biggest hurdle was creating the work. I dealt with so much trying to cultivate this story, and there were times I was afraid the writing would never come. I just had to power through and protect my time.

IRIS: If there is one lesson that you would want your readers to learn from your book, what would it be and why?

TM: I'd like people to know that love and healing are possible for people who can't see it for themselves. People can learn to do better. Every day I'm trying to do better for myself, and that's the lesson I received from writing the book. Writing about what happened to me allowed me to move forward and honor how far I've come.

NOURA: I wanted to know how it felt for her to write this book? how did she feel knowing that this book would be read by millions across the world, where people will know her story?

TM: I feel so anxious, Noura, and open-hearted. I wanted to leave something artistically significant as a legacy to my children and as a memorial to my mother. I couldn't have predicted that the book would resonate with women the way it has, and I'm just very thankful for that.

Continued...

Keith wrote: "When, if ever, do we switch off the work handset, stop reading work emails, stop reading reports? "

This is a very good point Keith, it actually impacts my husband more than myself, but he gets alerts and messages if the servers or database break down in his office, and so he has to work (for hours sometimes) at weekends or in the evenings to get things fixed --- before smart phones it would have just had to wait until the morning.
Smart phones have killed family life for so many, France have got it right with the ban on out of office emails: https://www.theguardian.com/money/201...

---

For women starting their own business it is very hard, not least because people in powerful positions (yes, men again) don't want to give women a chance or simply feel that a business will fail because women are running it, here is a very interesting article when some women who started their own business created a new 'fake' partner called who was male... and only then people started listening to them! https://www.fastcompany.com/40456604/...

This thread has been seriously derailed. Can we please get back to the subject in hand?

OSS does not tolerate personal insults and any member that chooses to break the rules will no longer be welcome here.

This competition is now closed, winners will be sent a message in due course by a member of the moderating team.

Thanks to everyone who entered!

LAST FEW HOURS LEFT TO ENTER THIS COMPETITION!

This Competition closes on April 3rd....so get your entries in ;-)

Dear OSS,
We are very happy to have an Our Shared Shelf exclusive! Author Terese Marie Mailhot reads excerpts from our March/April book: Heart Berries! Please follow this link to watch the video: https://www.goodreads.com/videos/1332...

I agree with Keith and Pam, this thread needs to get back on topic.

Benarji, of course you are very welcome to share your opinion but it's difficult to just come in here and say "women are this" and "women are that" which is why they fail in business. It's attitudes like this from men which prevent a woman from ever getting her foot through the door - it's all just based on assumption.

Dear OSS,
We are very pleased to give you the chance to win a copy of our current book selection: Heart Berries by Terese Marie Mailhot. We have 45 copies to give away (open worldwide).

For your chance to win a copy please can you post a sentence or two in the comments section below describing why you think it’s important for OSS to highlight diverse voices.

That's it! We will randomise the winners selected from the best answers given.

Good Luck!
The OSS Mods

[EDIT: This competition closes on April 3rd!]

Deadline for questions is April 10th :)

Dear Our Shared Shelf,
We are incredibly excited to announce that favourite OSS author, Roxane Gay has very kindly agreed to interview the author or current book selection Terese Marie Mailhot exclusively for Our Shared Shelf! We would love to offer you (the members) the chance to throw in a few questions for Roxanne to ask Terese too, so please have a good think and ask your question in the comments below.

Thank you,
The OSS Mods

Dear OSS,
We are very excited to share Naomi Alderman's answers to your questions! You can find these below.

Many thanks,
The OSS Moderators

Ashley & Kerry - Who or what was the voice in Allie/Eve's head representative of? Was it supposed to be God, a manifestation of Allie/Eve's subconscious thoughts and desires, or something else? Was Allie/Eve schizophrenic?

Marvin - please! what happened to Tunde? he made it out of the trunk ok right? At the end, did Roxy already know he was alive or did she just not know he was dead; when she was talking to her dad?

These are very good questions that I do not intend to answer in any way ;-). I like the idea that a novel leaves some questions in the reader's mind to ponder. And it is *definitely* not my place to tell my readers whether - when 'holy people' and preachers say they're hearing the voice of God - they are sincere, or mentally ill, or really hearing the voice of God, or lying. What do you think?



Ashley - A wide diversity of people were covered in this book through the various characters and interactions between characters. Why were some groups left out, such as trans or gender-fluid people? If you had included them, how would The Power have manifested in such groups?


In fact a huge diversity of people were left out. There are no scenes in Asia at all, for example, and no main characters who are Asian. There are only glancing references to South America. I came to the conclusion when writing the novel that either I was going to write a book that was literally a million pages long and tried to cover in some way every possible human experience related to gender (ie all of them) or I was going to need to pick a few examples of different lives affected by the power and rely on the reader to ask themselves: how would this change my life?

Sometimes when I'm giving a talk about the book, someone will ask me how I think the power would affect their community - eg a woman from Afghanistan asked me how it would have affected the Afghani people and culture. My answer is: I really don't know! And I always ask: how do you think it would? I did the reading and research about the worlds, cultures and experiences I wrote about in the novel and not about all the cultures and experiences in the world. I hope people read the novel and think for themselves about how it would affect them, I hope they write fanfic of it (that would be an honour!) that I can read and find out how it would affect the infinite variety of lives on the planet.


Mary - Hi Naomi. Did you study any real life matriarchal societies when researching for your book?


I did! I read and thought about Meghalaya in particular. But of course, the society in The Power is not a matriarchal society as we understand it today, it's one that's built on the same principles as our patriarchy, ie the ability to threaten and cause violent pain.



Gabriela - How does Naomi Alderman imagine an utopia?

Iain M Banks' The Culture novels.


Jessica - Question for Naomi: what is next on the horizon for you? What topics are swirling around your head these days?

I'm thinking a lot about fake news, right now. I feel like the amount and *quality* of convincing misinformation on the internet these days is a genuine apocalyptic threat to human civilization.



Anna - When I read 'The Power', one of the first things that struck me was the idea that something seismic could happen in society, causing a critical mass of women to finally stand up to men and put an end to the patriarchal way they had previously been subordinated. I read that, and I laughed, I thought, nothing like that will ever happen in my lifetime. Then the Weinstein scandal broke, and more and more women came forwards, and several months on, things really do seem to be moving forwards for women. Do you think the Weinstein scandal will be our tipping point? Will it be enough to bring about lasting change for women in the western world, and do you think this could also help women in other countries whose lives are far more affected by misogyny and sexism?

We are in the middle of a long road, and many women stand behind us who created seismic change already. Please do read Mary Wollstonecraft and bell hooks, Audre Lord and about the Suffragists. Understand that women have done this work again and again and again. Not so very long ago, women were not allowed an education, or to vote. Children were considered the property of the father and wives the property of their husbands. Marital rape was made a crime in the UK during my lifetime. Determined women changed that through the power of argument, debate and conviction. No single generation will finish all the work that needs to be done - there is so much, all around the world - but I hope every generation will push us forward a little. It's a project I am hugely proud to be part of, it is the centre of my life. My life is possible because of the work done by many thousands of women before me. I hope to hand on a little more liberty and justice to the generations that come after me.



Ross - Naomi, do you feel equality is a viable goal how would women and men best avoid the pitfalls of power shown so well in the book.

There will always be some inequality in the world. Why? Because human children are born very very small and powerless and dependent on larger adult caregivers. We come into the world unequal. A cruel or careless caregiver means that your life chances will be worse. No system has yet been devised better than letting parents raise their children though, so we have to accept that inequality is built into the system. What we can do is try to always be very open to hearing about the injustices of the world and correcting them insofaras we can. See the next answer for a link to an article with some thoughts.



Emma - How can we best combat gender stratification without causing a complete reversal in dominant gender roles (i.e. making all genders equal without the previously oppressed one the new dominant one)?

We can stop "leaning in" to the gender stratification that already exists. I put a few ideas here: https://www.theguardian.com/commentis...


Isha & Ozge - What was your inspiration behind choosing the title of the book? Does it signify that power in itself is a corrupting factor, no matter which gender chooses to wield it?

Fiona - My question is - you managed to write a novel that is quite rightly regarded as a feminist story. But in it, the women have the power and some of them behave badly, abusing their power. My personal interpretation of this was that it's not healthy to have a society where either gender is dominant, but that equality is what we all need. (I'm coming to the question....!) Is that your message, is that a correct interpretation and how do you think that you as a writer managed to convey that message?

I don't really believe in authors coming in to tell the "message" of their work. But I think you guys have understood me :-).


Giuseppina - Do you have advice for artists/writers about how to make the most of the opportunity of being mentored?

Don't be afraid to ask all your questions even (especially) the ones that seem stupid to you.


Pranav - Were you afraid about the acceptance of the novel by feminists?

I was pretty sure that smart people would understand what I was saying, and not come away thinking "why, this is a book about how women are evil!" ;-)

Dear Our Shared Shelf,
We are super happy to be giving away 60 copies of our current read 'Why I'm No Longer Talking to White People About Race' by Reni Eddo-Lodge.

For your chance to win a copy, simply tell us why you think this book is so important now.
Please leave your reply in the comments below, the best answers will be put forward and chosen via a randomised system.
The competition closes in 1 week: February 23rd.

GOOD LUCK!

The OSS Moderators.

Ashwin wrote: "Recently, a movie called Padman was released in India which is based on the life of Arunachalam Muruganantham, who took the initiative to provide sanitary napkins to the women in the rural areas, i..."

This is absolutely Amazing! :)

Orange is the New Black. This is an amazing TV show about women from all different backgrounds and different races. It's a must watch - it's very funny in places, but also has a serious side which tackles women's issues.

Also, as many people have mentioned Big Little Lies is fantastic.

I think boycotting an author for their remarks is right, they are solely to blame and a sale of their books gives them the riches they do not deserve.

I think in the case of someone like Kevin Spacey it can be seen a little differently. For example Kevin Spacey is currently in one of the greatest series on TV - House of Cards. So should you boycott House of Cards? Sure, Spacey deserves all the shit being thrown at him, but what about the likes of Robin Wright? She is a tremendous actress who plays the part of a very powerful women perfectly! Should her work (and the other members of the cast and crew) suffer because of Kevin Spacey? If anything, they should just write him out of the series and let her take over...rather than cancelling the whole show!

FYI - I don't think the likes of Kevin Spacey should be allowed to carry on working, but equally his disgusting behaviour shouldn't mean that the rest of the cast should miss out.
I think Ridley Scott had the right idea by erasing Kevin Spacey from 'All the Money in the World'.

Maria wrote: "I also did not receive my book, but an email came from DHL saying that my package arrived on November 22, but so far it has not arrived. I do not know what is happening. I have also sent some email..."

Have you checked in your local sorting office?
If it says it has arrived it quite often says "handed to resident" or "left with neighbour" or "Taken to the sorting office" - it's worth checking.

It might also be worth calling DHL, you'll probably get a lot further when talking to someone rather than emailing :)

Lorraine, if you can PM me your address I will pass on to Cordelia.

Thanks!
Jo

Hi Everyone,
Naomi Alderman - the author of our current read 'The Power' has very kindly agreed to answer some questions from members of Our Shared Shelf!
If you would like to ask her a question, please post it below in the comments.

Unfortunately we won't be able to ask Naomi all of the questions, so try and think of some good ones and fingers crossed yours in chosen! :)

Many thanks,
The OSS Moderators

Just a couple of hours to go before this competition closes - so get your entries in ASAP :)