What question would you like to ask Isabel Allende?
We’re very excited to announce that Isabel Allende has kindly agreed to an email interview with Women Writers, Women Books.
And we’d really like you to be involved too. What question would YOU like to ask Isabel?
Please leave your question in the comment section below. We’ll choose the most original ones for the interview!
Category: Contemporary Women Writers, Interviews
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- Interview with Isabel Allende | September 16, 2013
My question is about the relationship between Eliza Sommers and Tao Chi’en in Daughter of Fortune and Portrait in Sepia. I’ve read other works of fictions that detail what you might call a feminist transformation in a woman’s life, but what’s really unique about these two works is that they follow the individual feminist transformations of Eliza Sommers and Tao Chi’en. And really, it’s the coming together of these two individual transformations that allows us to observe the relationship between them, that you might also call feminist/progressive and that opposes the traditional presentation of romantic relationships we so often see in other works.
I would like for you to talk about how you came to understand that a relationship could be like Eliza Sommers and Tao Chi’en’s relationship. More specifically, what do you think their relationship has to teach us about love?
You seem to be fond of, or at least feel sympathy for, your characters, even Esteban Garcia in ‘House of the Spirits’, who you describe as ‘evil’. How much does that literary empathy translate into your own day-to-day life?
I usually read your books in spanish and I always wonder how much writing changes in the process of translation, so have you seen translation affecting your writing in any way?
Thank you for teaching me this:
You only have what you give. It is by spending yourself that you become rich.
Wherever you are be there.
(Your essay for This I believe was very poignant , your a great role model for me as an aspiring latin american writer. )
Have you ever experienced magic in your own life? Or something that felt like magic?
Do you ever suffer from writer’s block and, if so, how do you overcome it?
Your stories often deal with the magical and fantastical. They remind me of fairytales and blend superstition with legends and reality. Do you believe in magic and, if so, why?
I read “La casa de Los espiritus” in Spanish (easily one of the most gorgeous books I’ve ever read), then several of your other books in English and I was wondering about how you select translators. Do you get to work closely with them? Does your publisher assign them for your books that are sold to international markets?
I watched your inspiring TED Talk about the magic of passion and the need for women to work for fundamental change in the world. I think many people may feel a bit intimidated by the enormity of that challenge, either believing their individual actions won’t matter, or unsure of how to begin. Do you have some suggestions for personal ‘first steps’ on the road to meaningful change?
What was the inspiration behind the characters in Daughter of Fortune? (was in China when she came to talk in Cambridge in 2001, though thanks to my friend I have a signed copy.
Do you recognise the genre ”magical realism” and would you describe your own writing as belonging to this genre or sub-genre? I love the fact your novels explore the edges of what we know and what we don’t know and that blurred bit in between. I’d love to be able to write magical realism but find my writing falls flat if I stray too far from the real and the things I know or am most familiar with. Have you any advice for writing about the magical or unknown?
In hindsight.. do you sometimes discover your story is also a vehicle to explain, or clarify your beliefs, albeit unconsciously?
Your novels have a huge canvas. Do you plan the whole thing in advance and let it fall apart in the writing, then pull it together at the end? Or hold it all in mind throughout the writing? Or do you begin with a cast of characters, bring them out to play and see where they take you?
Question for Isabel Allende: You are a successful writer who enjoys robust sales of your books. It seems to me that high volume sales mean your work speaks to people and that is what writing is all about. Why are you criticized for your achievements? Are your critics jealous of you?
What advice do u have for a writer whose goal is to be on the New York Times top ten best seller list?