T A B L E+T A L K Why is there such a backlash against memoirs? Join the discussion in the Books section of Table Talk R E C E N T L Y Gore Vidal By Chris Haines (01/14/98) Russell Banks By Cynthia Joyce (01/05/98) Haruki Murakami By Laura Miller (12/16/97) Allan Gurganus By Dwight Garner (12/08/97) Mark Leyner By Laura Miller (12/08/97) - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - INTERVIEW ARCHIVE R E V I E W S Now and then By Joseph Heller A rambling, frequently amusing memoir about a childhood spent on Coney Island, from the author of "Catch-22." (02/02/98)		T O N I_ M O R R I S O N++PAGE 2 OF 3 - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - Have you noticed a change in the intelligence of the criticism of your books over the years? I have. Over time, they've become much more intelligent, they've become much more sensitive, they've given up some of the laziness they had before. There was a time when my books, as well as everybody else's books, were viewed as sociological revelations. Is this the best view of the black family, or not? I remember once, in the New Yorker, being reviewed, I think it was "Beloved," and the reviewer began the review and spent a lot of time talking about Bill Cosby's television show -- the kind of black family to be compared with the family in "Beloved." It was so revolting. And that notion -- once I was reviewed in the New York Review of Books, with two other black writers. The three of us, who don't write anything alike, were lumped together by color, and then the reviewer ended by deciding which of the three books was the best. And she chose one, which could have been [the best], but the reason it was the best was because it was more like "real" black people. That's really discouraging. So if you have that kind of reduction to the absurd, you just have to keep on trying. Do you see a place for gay literature, Indian literature, black literature, black women's literature -- in a positive way? Oh, absolutely. It's changing everything. They may take longer; the marketing shapes how we understand these books. Some Native American writers enjoy being called Native American writers. I had a student who was Native American and I told him, "You're going to have trouble getting this book accepted, because there are no moccasins, there are no tomahawks." And he did. He had enormous trouble. I mean, submissions, I don't even want to repeat the number, but he finally did have this book published, and you know, it's a first novel -- it got excellent reviews -- but the point was that the rejections, I know, were based on the inability to think of Native Americans, in this particular case, as Americans. You teach writing at Princeton. Can writing can be taught? I think some aspects of writing can be taught. Obviously, you can't expect to teach vision or talent. But you can help with comfort. Or confidence? Well, that I can't do much about. I'm very brutal about that. I just tell them: You have to do this, I don't want to hear whining about how it's so difficult. Oh, I don't tolerate any of that because most of the people who've ever written are under enormous duress, myself being one them. So whining about how they can't get it is ridiculous. What I can do very well is what I used to do, which is edit. I can follow their train of thought, see where their language is going, suggest other avenues. I can do that, and I can do that very well. I like to get in the manuscript. How did you juggle being an editor, being a writer and being a mother? When I look back at those years, when I was going into an office every day, when my children were small, I don't really understand how all that came about. Why was I doing all these things at once? Partly, it was because I felt I was the breadwinner, so I had to do everything that would put me in a position of independence to take care of my family. But the writing was mine, so that I stole. I stole away from the world. So when did you write? Very, very early in the morning, before they got up. I'm not very good at night. I don't generate much. But I'm a very early riser, so I did that, and I did it on weekends. In the summers, the kids would go to my parents in Ohio, where my sister lives -- my whole family lives out there -- so the whole summer was devoted to writing. And that's how I got it done. It seems a little frenetic now, but when I think about the lives normal women live -- of doing several things -- it's the same. They do anything that they can. They organize it. And you learn how to use time. You don't have to learn how to wash the dishes every time you do that. You already know how to do that. So, while you're doing that, you're thinking. You know, it doesn't take up your whole mind. Or just on the subway. I would solve a lot of literary problems just thinking about a character in that packed train, where you can't do anything anyway. Well, you can read the paper, but you're sort of in there. And then I would think about, well, would she do this? And then sometimes I'd really get something good. By the time I'd arrived at work, I would jot it down so I wouldn't forget. It was a very strong interior life that I developed for the characters, and for myself, because something was always churning. There was no blank time. I don't have to do that anymore. But still, I'm involved in a lot of things, I mean, I don't go out very much. Who is Lois? Your book is dedicated to Lois. My sister. The one who just called [laughter]. Who's your editor at Knopf? I have two editors. Erroll McDonald and Sonny Mehta? Yes. You know, I had an editor, Bob Gottlieb, for all my books through "Beloved." Then he went to the New Yorker. I had to find an editor. And everybody said, "You don't need one, do you?" And I said, "Yes, because I used to be one. I know the value of a good editor." I mean, somebody just to talk to. Bob was very good at that. I learned a lot, just in the conversations. He's funny, he's literate and really able to tell you things -- it's not so much writing in the margins of the manuscript, but ... Macro-thinking? That's right. And so Sonny followed him at Knopf -- whom I like a lot, who is terrifically smart about books and publishing. But he was the president of Knopf. Bob Gottlieb was also the president, but he was the only president that also edited manuscripts, who line-edited. Sonny doesn't do that. I mean, he shouldn't do it. Most presidents don't do it. But I wanted someone who ... Would have that capacity ... That's right. So they said, "What combination do you want?" Even though Erroll McDonald works at Pantheon. So Erroll is your actual editor? He's my ... yes. My lines. I have no hesitancy about his abilities at all; he's extremely good, oh man, and he's read everything, he can make connections. And he monitors the book in-house, you know, to see what people are doing -- you know, the covers -- the fabric and paper and all of that really important stuff. "Jazz" was pretty much complete when I engaged this dual editorship, so he had less to do with that. With "Paradise," I was able to send him the manuscript, say, when I had 100 pages, and get some feedback on it. So the levels of intensity have been different because I've submitted the manuscript under different circumstances. So did he actually line-edit the full manuscript, or is it hands off on the fiction? What he does is write me long, interesting letters. And the letters contain information about what's strong, what's successful, what troubles him, what stands out as being really awful, that kind of thing. Which is what you want. You have stated, I think it was in the Times, that there was still work to be done, you realized, on "Paradise." I regard them all that way, all those books I've written. Years later, I read them, or read them in public, and say ... "Should have done that ..." Or "Should not have done this," or maybe, you know, this line. And it goes on forever. In terms of "Paradise," what is your personal assessment of -- Of what I could have done? I wanted another kind of confrontation with Patricia, the one who kept the genealogies together. Yes, which she burns at the end. And some of those young women. You know, like Anna. She has a confrontation with Rev. Meisner -- but you know about her, what they think about her, but she has a very subjective view. She's the daughter of someone whom she felt they despised, so she has an ax to grind. So she's reevaluating everything, and has come to learn some terrible things, she thinks, about this town. A friend said to me, "Why don't you ask Toni Morrison what makes her really angry?" You know, I've lost it [the anger]. It's a very, very strange thing. I was telling someone this summer that I felt some [turning point], and I didn't know what it was, you know. It's because I've lost the anger now -- and I'm feeling really sad. And that seemed so sad to me. Really sad to me. Now, I did get angry recently, about this daughter [in the book]. And I hadn't felt that furious about someone who isn't in my personal life. Because I get angry about things, then go on and work. And today I was a little angry about Justina. Justina? Justina was that little girl whose mother helped the lover kill her. Oh God. In the New York Post, yes. And the part that reduced me to just smoldering anger was when she says she held her hands, as she was drowning. That was just the most horrible detail. And I dwelt on it, and dwelt on it, until I was in a state. Yes, I really wanted to write about her, the child. So I get enraged about something like that, but generally speaking, I guess it comes with being over 64, you just get sort of melancholy. Melancholy -- meaning you're resigned, or passive, in your responses? It's overload. You sort of struggle to do four good things when you're my age, and then not deal. I even tell my students that: four things. Make a difference about something other than yourselves. What are those four things? That I do? Let's say, in the last year? Well, I think the book is one, [my teaching] is another, and the other two, I don't want to talk about. N E X T+P A G E +| Totally convinced of O.J. Simpson's innocence