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2014 Book Club Discussions
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March 2014: The Golem and the Jinni - Author Q&A with Helene Wecker
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The Wecker Q&A is almost nonexistent!My question: how much research went into the crafting of this book, whether it be lore, culture, etc? How long did this take to write?
Apologies if these are overly common questions that I've simply never seen asked.
Don't have any questions to ask but I wanted to express my gratitude for you agreeing to do a Q&A! Thank you :D
Joel wrote: "The Wecker Q&A is almost nonexistent!My question: how much research went into the crafting of this book, whether it be lore, culture, etc? How long did this take to write?
Apologies if these are..."
Hi Joel! Thanks for your questions. The book took about seven years to write, from the beginning of the idea (2005) to sending the final manuscript to my editor (2012). Over that time, I did an enormous amount of research. (Well, it felt enormous to me. I’m sure it was nothing compared to writing a history PhD dissertation or something.) I started off with almost no knowledge of what life was like in 1899 New York. I had a few vague impressions from movies and the like, but I learned pretty quickly that those were usually flawed at best. Luckily I had access to the Columbia University library, so I could dig through their archives: old newspaper articles, neighborhood census information, turn-of-the-century maps, and so on. That gave me a foundation to work from. Then I read a number of books on New York written in at the turn of the century, like Jacob Riis’ How the Other Half Lives and Stephen Crane’s Maggie: A Girl of the Streets They were helpful not just for the bare facts, but also for the flavor of the writing, and the very clear societal attitudes and biases of the time. (Riis in particular is a very problematic writer, who spends a lot of time talking about the “character” of various racial groups.) Then I dug into the more contemporary, scholarly research. Little Syria was in some ways the hardest subject, because there wasn’t all that much available in English, especially when compared to the number of books you can find about the Jewish Lower East Side. But enough scholars have tackled the subject in recent years that I eventually got a handle on the neighborhood.
Once I moved to California, a lot of my research came from online resources. The New York Public Library’s digital archives were instrumental for their photography collections. They let me see for myself what the neighborhoods looked like at the turn of the century – not just the general layout, but the atmosphere as well. And I relied on the New York Tenement Museum website for information about the old tenement apartments. I also visited the museum when I lived in NYC, and I highly recommend it to anyone who’s looking for something fun to do in the city.
Brilliant response and a brilliant novel - thanks!
Hi Helene, thank you so much for doing this Q&A!My question is, why did you decide on a Golem and a Jinni as the two central characters in the novel? Did the whole idea of the novel originate from these two specific fictional creatures, or were there other types of fictional creatures under consideration?
Hey Helene, any idea when your next book will be coming out? Can you tell us anything about it?
Jeff wrote: "Hi Helene, thank you so much for doing this Q&A!My question is, why did you decide on a Golem and a Jinni as the two central characters in the novel? Did the whole idea of the novel originate fro..."
The idea originated specifically from these creatures, so I never considered turning the Jinni into a vampire or anything like that. But I arrived at the creatures themselves through a roundabout, semi-autobiographical path. My husband is Arab-American (his father is from Syria), I'm Jewish, and we both grew up in the suburbs of Chicago. When we met -- more than half my lifetime ago, now -- I was quickly struck by the similarities in our family histories, specifically around immigration to America: the startling effects of landing in a new culture, learning a new language, and having to decide what of your old life to keep and what to let go. And then, being the child or grandchild of an immigrant, and having that heritage (and burden, at times) handed down to you. So when I arrived at Columbia University to get my master's in fiction, I started working on a collection of short stories that combined tales from his family and my family, hoping to draw out these similarities. But the collection refused to come together. Some of the stories just weren't very good. The rest were decent, nothing too special, but didn't work together coherently. I complained to a friend in my workshop about it, and she pointed out something I hadn't realized: I was writing these very realist stories, but my heart really belonged to the sci-fi and fantasy that I'd grown up reading. She challenged me to add a fantastical element to the stories, and see if that would unblock the writing. So I decided that instead of Jewish girl and Arab-American boy who'd been the main characters in these stories, I'd change them into what I considered the most recognizable folkloric creatures from each culture: a golem and a jinni. At first I thought it was just another short story, but very quickly it turned into something a lot bigger, and I realized I had a novel on my hands. As I wrote, the characters developed their own personalities and concerns. The specific aspects of the story that were based on my families gradually fell away -- leaving only the core immigrant story itself, the shock and displacement of arriving in an entirely new place and feeling it change you.
Michael wrote: "Hey Helene, any idea when your next book will be coming out? Can you tell us anything about it?"I have no idea when the next one's coming out, to be honest! My last year or so has been all about THE GOLEM AND THE JINNI's post-publishing phase (promotion and travel and so on), and I'm only now clearing the decks for the next book. As for what I can tell you about it, it might very well turn out to be a sequel to TGATJ. Nothing definite yet, but current signs are favorable! Stay tuned...
Soo .... Here's where you can ask her questions. Be sure to use spoiler tags where appropriate.
* And a big Thank You! to Helene Wecker for agreeing to do this for us :)