Julie Orringer Discussion Group discussion
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Wow! Thanks, Julie. I really appreciated what you said about following the story rather than the market. That gives me a great deal of much needed encouragement. Your work was a huge inspiration for me, and I felt like each and every sentence in it was purposeful, and helped me as a reader feel that much more connected to your characters.Cannot wait to read your current project!
QUESTION: “I have another question that I wondered last year as I was reading The Invisible Bridge. Out of all the themes you covered throughout the book, what made you finally decide on that name? Or did you know from the beginning what the title would be?”
ANSWER: It took me a long time to find the right title for the book. I didn’t consider “The Invisible Bridge” until about a year after I’d finished the first draft of the novel. Just the other day, actually, I was thumbing through an old notebook and came across my original notes about that title: “The invisible bridge between Budapest and Paris? The bridge he wants to build between his apartment and Klara’s? An invisible bridge between Andras and his brothers while he’s away? Between Andras and Klara while he’s in the work service? In the forced-labor newspaper, there could be an article about how architect-engineer Andras Lévi creates the perfect bridge. ‘The materials weigh nothing, and it can be constructed in almost no time’...etc. Could also suggest a bridge to an earlier time before the war, when Andras was a student; as a means of crossing the border when they’re leaving in 1956; as a way of remaining connected to Tibor. Storytelling is another invisible bridge.” The more I considered it, the more connections seemed to arise, and the title stuck.
QUESTION: “I was wondering--as a writer, when you first set out to become published, how long did it take you to secure a literary agent and see your work finalized? With The Invisible Bridge, did you encounter any resistance due to the length of the story? Many writers have shared that it is very difficult to publish books beyond a certain word count. I am interested to hear about any of the challenges you faced as a writer seeking to become published. Do you have any words of advice?”
ANSWER: I started working with my literary agent, Kim Witherspoon, after a story of mine was published in The Paris Review. I wasn’t really looking for an agent then; I’d published only a few short stories, and didn’t know if I’d ever want to write a novel. But Kim contacted me and asked to see more work, and soon afterward we met and decided to work together. She urged me to keep writing short stories. Three years later, after I’d written and revised nine of them, we decided to try to find an editor for the book. Fortunately, around that time, I started thinking about a novel too. We placed both books under contract at the same time. I knew the novel was going to be a long one, but my editor at Knopf, Jordan Pavlin, liked the idea and made sure I had time to finish it. Neither she nor Kim ever rushed me toward a deadline or made me feel as if I should start making cuts before they looked at the manuscript. When my students ask for advice along these lines, I tell them they should write according to the demands of the story, rather than according to some idea of what the market wants. Of course, a novel requires great economy too, even or especially when it’s a long one. Every word and image must count, just as in a short story. The first draft of this novel was about nine hundred pages, and I ended up cutting almost three hundred.
QUESTION: “I am writing a novel based on my father in-law's memoir. It starts after his liberation from the camps when he returns to his village in Hungary to await the return of any other family members. I haven't found much research about how people returned from the camps (actual methods and length of time) and what happened when they returned home (i.e. his home was occupied by a local communist official). Based on your research can you recommend any sources for liberation and return stories? I loved Invisible Bridges and it is definitely acting as an inspiration for a first time novelist like me.”
ANSWER: What an interesting subject. That was such a crazy, chaotic time—many people had difficulty returning home, and some (like my grandfather) were deported to the Soviet Union along the way. I found interesting accounts of post-camp experiences in the work of Randolph Braham—he has a few books in which survivors’ stories are collected, and he also has a wonderful and comprehensive two-volume work called The Politics of Genocide, about all aspects of the Holocaust in Hungary. Most good research libraries have copies of his books.