KYD: I loved how language spoke to the reader in Sour Heart. Or maybe faith is the wrong word – maybe what I never lost was curiosity? I was surprised by how much faith I had in myself, not that it was super steady and unwavering, but it was always there. In some ways, it was good to want something for so long and then to realise that achieving something that remained elusive for some time doesn’t have to end in existential dread.
‘It’s cool to realise that certain obsessions are lifelong, some questions only lead to more questions.’
For so long I wanted to publish and I also feared doing it – what if I ran out of things to write about? It was both a relief and a disappointment to realise that I had more than just one thing to say.
Jenny Zhang: It’s cool to be able to track what I was interested in and to realise that certain obsessions are lifelong, some questions only lead to more questions. As you look back, have you learned anything surprising or unexpected about yourself in the process of getting these stories out into the world? KYD: These stories were written during your twenties, in your undergraduate and graduate years, in college. I spoke to Jenny about what’s to be gained in taking time with your writing, telling stories that are the opposite of what people expect of us, and evolving as a person in spite of social media. And they dare us as readers not to study them with scrutiny, but to live amongst them, breathing the same air. They dare to be ungrateful and stubborn and petty. She shows us young girls who speak freely about their bowel movements, desires, and failures with ease. In Sour Heart’s pages, Zhang’s imagination soars. Told from the perspective of several young women looking back on their childhoods, each interconnected story explores the blind spots of generational divides that stretch and ache in a new country, and the residual excesses of familial love and resentment. Sour Heart centres around a specific community of Chinese-American immigrant families who moved from an affluent world of literati and art-making in Shanghai to the newfound possibilities and fickleness of New York in the 80s and 90s. Zhang’s 2015 essay ‘ How It Feels ’, first published in Poetry magazine, was nominated for a National Magazine Award, and is also included in The Selected Jenny Zhang. Born in Shanghai, raised in New York and now living in Brooklyn, Jenny Zhang is the author of two non-fiction collections, one poetry collection and the newly released short story collection, Sour Heart.
0 kommentar(er)
