Qaisra Shahraz Interview

Qaisra Shahraz, born in Pakistan, is a critically acclaimed novelist and scriptwriter and has lived in Manchester since she was nine.  Her books have been published in numerous countries and translated into various languages and we are very proud to have her as site sponsor until November. We interviewed her to find out more about her and her latest novel “Revolt”

Why do you write? Have you always wanted to be a writer?

I have wanted to write since I was 15. I don’t know why. My school friend tells me that I had a vivid imagination, loved making up stories and enjoyed telling them to my other school friends.  Now I cannot think of life without writing fiction. It’s a real career, blossoming on an international scale.

Tell us a bit about your latest novel Revolt, what sparked the story? In what way is it different from your other novels?

Revolt is my third novel, set in Pakistan and England.

It deals with topical issues like migration, mixed race marriage, generation, East/West, poverty/wealth and urban/ rural gap. Those readers who have enjoyed my previous 2 novels The Holy Woman and Typhoon can regard it like a trilogy, although the characters are totally different and the canvas far broader.

It’s a story of Gulistan, a fictitious village in Pakistan and the lives of three wealthy land owning sisters and their children, servants and other households in the district.

There is a substantial gap between your novel Typhoon, and your latest novel Revolt, is there a story you tell about that period?

Yes – a very big gap. Eight years to be precise. This novel was written at a different phase of my life; the successful stage with many demands on my time. I had a high profile educational post as a quality manager for two years and during this time the novel was totally forgotten.

I loved the world of the village I had created and the manuscript just grew and grew – ending up into a block buster of a novel – long. Therefore it took me twice as long to get from one end to the other. Then I was not happy with the quality of the writing. As I tell my fellow writers, I ‘sat on it’ for 2 years, editing and chiseling away to improve it. God knows how many drafts I have written of this novel. My editor, lovely Karen, had to drag it off me – to send it to the printers this summer! Now I am happy with the final draft.

 How do your stories form themselves, do you have a clear idea in your head, do you plan beforehand?

These days with a lot of international travel, I pick up ideas for stories from different sources, to write about. For example my recent story The Slave Catcher originated from my stay in Boston. It is about slavery. The Train to Krakow on the subject of the Holocaust resulted from a visit to the concentration camps in Auschwitz in Poland with a group of Muslim and Jewish friends.

A Pair of Jeans (studied in universities and schools, especially in Germany) is based on my own experience as young migrant woman living in Britain with multiple identities. The Holy Woman originated from an idea picked up from a TV documentary. Obviously there is creative planning for any piece of fiction. However, with some stories more so than with others. For instance I had to do a lot of research for The Slave Catcher set in 19^th century Boston. Similarly I have to do a lot of first hand research for the novel I am currently writing, The Henna Painter set in Morocco, by living there for a few days to ‘absorb’ local atmosphere and detail.

What do you consider to be the most difficult part of writing? Have you ever suffered from writer’s block? If so, what did you do to overcome it?

The writing of the first draft – getting scenes, dialogue, description onto a page from the head as a novelist is the challenging part of writing but also very exciting too – as the story begins to take shape and characters come alive. As a scriptwriter, the jig sawing and joining of separate scenes to create exciting episodes as well as by embedding as much conflict and drama as possible is also quite difficult. I was taught on my degree course in scriptwriting to ‘milk’ each scene for drama – otherwise it is redundant.

Suffered writer’s block? Hardly ever. I have no time to have a writers’ block. However  there is a new distraction on the scene which is eating up my creative time quite significantly – online social media! I find myself often being lured either onto Twitter, or Facebook. When I wrote my first novel 17 years ago I had more ‘quality’ writing time. Also there were no world literary tours or promotional events to plan. Sometimes I have to snatch time to write as my writing is sandwiched between education work and demanding family life. The question I am often asked is how do I manage it all?

What were your first impressions of the UK when you arrived as a nine year old?

Cold wintry environment, with foggy skies, nice teachers, small houses, racism, people calling you names. And coming from a Muslim country, it was at first shocking to see adults kissing openly on streets everywhere and on television.

The racism in particular affected me; it’s a terrible experience to go through as a child. Once a brick was thrown through our bedroom window nearly hitting my baby brother. I found it deeply distressing. I have never forgotten that incidence.

How do you view your life in England overall? 

My experience of living in England has been very positive. I love my city of Manchester – there is so much going on. I also loved my time at school. Wonderful teachers helped me to progress well in my studies. Teacher can make a long lasting difference to your life. I loved reading children’s books including Enid Blyton’s and later the classics, Charles Dickens, Thomas Hardy, Jane Austen, George Eliot etc.

Have you written your biography? 

No I have not written my biography nor have any intention of ever writing one. Too embarrassing! However, a literary textbook edited by university academics has been published on my work entitled, ‘The Holy and the Unholy; Critical essays on Qaisra Shahraz’s fiction’  with papers on my two novels and stories, from different countries including from Germany, India and Morocco. It’s been a very humbling experience indeed.

Stories from your childhood? Are they published?

I have a written a collection of short stories entitled ‘A Pair of Jeans & Other Stories’, recently published as an e book on kindle. Some of these stories like ‘A Pair of Jeans’ and ‘Elopement’ explore cross cultural issues – of what it was like growing up as a migrant in Britain, leading two lives, that of the home and one outside, walking in and out of two cultures – British and Pakistani Muslim culture.

We’ll feature part 2 later this week!

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Find out more about Qaisra on her website www.qaisrashahraz.com  Follow Qaisra on twitter @Qaisrashahraz

Her book Revolt can be bought here 

Links to her other novels: Typhoon , The Holy Woman and A pair of Jeans

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Category: Contemporary Women Writers