Leslie Pietrzyk is the author of two novels, Pears on a Willow Tree and A Year and a Day. This Angel on My Chest, her collection of linked short stories, won the 2015 Drue Heinz Literature Prize and was published by the University of Pittsburgh Press in October 2015. Kirkus Reviews named it one of the 16 best story collections of the year. Her short fiction and essays have appeared in many publications, including Gettysburg Review, The Sun, Shenandoah, The Collagist, River Styx, Iowa Review, TriQuarterly, New England Review, Salon, Washingtonian, and the Washington Post Magazine. She has received fellowships from the Bread Loaf Writers’ Conference and the Sewanee Writers’ Conference. Pietrzyk is a member of the core fiction faculty at the Converse low-residency MFA program and teaches in the MA Program in Writing at Johns Hopkins University. Raised in Iowa, she now lives in Alexandria, Virginia. More info: www.lesliepietrzyk.com On Twitter: @lesliepwriter
Her story, "One True Thing," appeared in Issue Sixty-Seven of The Collagist.
Here, she speaks with interviewer Dana Diehl about writers’ conferences, “two truths and a lie,” and how point of view shapes a story.
What inspired you to write this story?
On one level, I wrote this story to fill a gap in my collection of unconventionally linked short stories, THIS ANGEL ON MY CHEST. Those stories are based on my experience of losing my first husband to a heart attack when he was 37 years old. The stories are linked by incident; a young husband has died in each story. What I wanted to create when I started writing “One True Thing” was the story that would explain to the reader this linkage, and show why there was a book filled with dead husbands. But the story spiraled beyond the parameters of that initial plan, serving an entirely different purpose in the collection, suggesting to the reader the relevance of point of view when considering the ways we think of people who have died. And on a more concrete level, I wrote this story because I needed an environment where people would logically play that parlor game of “two truths and a lie.” Once I thought of a writers’ conference, I saw potential in shifting up the form into a craft lecture, and that’s when I realized I could easily work in my theories about point of view as well as indulge my fantasies about what it might be like to teach at a famous writers’ conference.
The introduction and headers in “One True Thing” call attention to the “story-ness” of the story. While reading, I felt this tension between wanting to disappear into the dream of the narrative and knowing that the segments were only examples being used to illustrate point of view. Can you speak to this narrative choice?
I wouldn’t consider the segments as “only” examples because they’re also the literal, real action of the story, being filtered through the tool of point of view. That is, we each live our lives as we do, but it’s the point of view that determines the shaped “story” of our lives. So each of those segments would have appeared very differently if told through a different point of view (or through the eyes of a different point of view character). The trick was choosing which point of view to use to advance the action most effectively, to elevate the story from being a gimmick to being the only possible way this story could be told, to ensure there were definable reasons for each point of view choice throughout the dozen or so sections.
I love that the points of view deemed the least reliable or legitimate (first person and second person, respectively) are used to write some of the most emotionally charged scenes. Do you agree with the narrator’s misgivings toward second and first person?
Most assuredly. I love writing (and reading) second person stories, but I agree with the craft lecture here, that it’s a tricky point of view to carry off and that it’s dangerous to use that POV in an MFA workshop. (Maybe the word isn’t so much “dangerous” as it is “tedious”…because at least half the allotted workshop time will be spent talking about how two-thirds of the class despises the second person.) I love the first person as well, but I’m mindful that if third person is the standard and default choice of POV, there must be a legitimate reason for choosing the first person. For me, that reason is often unreliability. While all fiction technically is a lie, I especially love lying within that lie, it seems, making me very fond of unreliable narrators.
How did you choose which sections of the story to write in a particular point of view? Did this develop organically?
I liked having this structure of a lecture on POV in place because “One True Thing” was an incredibly unwieldy story that took forever to finish, and structure calms me. Once I settled on the form, I knew I’d have to cover all the big POVs eventually, that at some point there would have to be a third person section, for example, and omniscient, and so on. Thinking about characteristics of each POV and its drawbacks and advantages (something I’ve discussed in countless writing classes!) helped me decide which part of the story’s action might be a suitable spot. The party scene cried out for omniscient whereas the wakeful moments alone in the dark night dictated internal monologue. Those two were the most challenging for me to write: being allowed to roam into anyone’s mind offered too much freedom. Originally, before turning to interior monologue, I took a stab at writing true stream of consciousness, and I’m convinced you have to be a genius to pull that off. My attempt was tiresome mush.
Are there any writers (or writers’ conferences!) that you’re really excited about right now?
Hmmm…I wish I were going to one of the big writers’ conferences this summer. But after the fabulous fun of the working residency for the Converse low-res MFA students (where I teach) it’s a stay-at-home summer, and after a year of book launch, that sounds pretty good to me. I definitely hope to use the time to catch up on my reading. Some writers I love to advocate at present are Lionel Shriver, who is relentless and brutal…try her novel, WE NEED TO TALK ABOUT KEVIN; Beryl Bainbridge (I recommend THE BIRTHDAY BOYS); and poet Roger Reeves (KING ME). Two of my friends are publishing books this summer and I’m thrilled to recommend these: YOU MAY SEE A STRANGER, linked stories by Paula Whyman; and HARMONY, a novel by Carolyn Parkhurst.
What projects are you working on now?
I am actually between big projects. I finished writing a novel a couple of months ago, a female bildungsroman set in 1980s Chicago during the Tylenol murders, and I’m waiting to see what the world will bring. And I have the glimmers of an idea for a new novel, but not quite the time and focus to sink into it just yet. So I’m trying to enjoy this interlude of peace and quiet—even as I’m getting terribly antsy from a lack of structure.