One Writer's Process: Sarah Miller

The author of the highly acclaimed Miss Spitfire: Reaching Helen Keller, Sarah Miller is the kind of writer who tries to write six days a week, having "figured out that even writing badly feels better than being mad at myself for skipping a day."

When writing, she likes to explore the lives of real people ... "people I'm fascinated with and become quite fond of by the time I'm done."

"It's rather a presumptuous thing to write someone else's story--even more so to try to write it in her own voice," Miller writes, explaining her effort to bring the story of Annie Sullivan and Helen Keller to life.

"The best any author of this sort of book can hope to do is present the truth as they see it. I am grateful that Annie herself knew this, and said so to Nella Braddy Henney: 'The truth of a matter is not what I tell you about it, but what you divine in regard to it.'

"I have kept this thought in my mind during the whole writing of this book. What you have read is what I have divined, and what I believe to be emotionally true. In her own way, I believe Annie would approve."

Already, Miller's work has attracted the attention of writers like Richard Peck, who describes Miss Spitfire as “high drama about how language unlocks the world.” Other accolades have come from ALA (Best Book for Young Adults), Booklist (Editor's Choice and Top 10 First Novels for Youth), Book Links (Lasting Connections of 2007 title), and the Cybils (finalist for the 2007 Middle Grade Fiction Award).

Currently at work on a novel about the final years of Russia's last imperial family, Miller was kind enough to take a moment to share her thoughts on writing with Wordswimmer.

Wordswimmer: If writing is like swimming...how do you get into the water each day?

Miller: Kicking and screaming, mostly. Or at least one toe at a time. I'm much more likely to dangle from the diving board for a while than to jump right in and start paddling.

Wordswimmer: What keeps you afloat... for short work? For longer work?

Miller: I'm not exactly sure. A lot of writers talk about how they just can't not write -- it gnaws or claws at them. For me it's not quite that intense, but something does always sort of nibble persistently at me if I haven't been writing for a few days. When things get tough, I wonder, "Why am I making myself do this?" and I can't even answer my own question. I just keep doing it. I think it's because I feel an obligation to my characters -- to see them through once I've started. It's not nice to leave them stranded in the open sea....

Wordswimmer: How do you keep swimming through dry spells?

Miller: I read a LOT. That keeps me immersed even if I'm not actually swimming myself.

Wordswimmer: What's the hardest part of swimming?

Miller: Rough drafts. I always feel like I'm drowning, or at least flailing around a whole lot. I'm not very good at at letting my first attempt at a story be messy.

Wordswimmer: How do you overcome obstacles, problems, when swimming alone?

Miller: That is a very timely question, as it so happens.

In many ways, I wrote Miss Spitfire in a vacuum. I had some smart, well-read folks I could bounce stuff off of from time to time, but in essence I was a rookie on my own. Now that I've been through the editing process and know what it's like to have a pro involved, I find myself fighting the urge to run crying to my editor at every little choppy patch in my path.

In reality, though, I definitely prefer to work alone. I'm awfully reluctant to share what I'm working on until it's in pretty decent shape, so that makes it hard for me to ask for help or input in the first place. Besides, when someone does read for me and has no suggestions for improvement, I don't believe them. On the other hand, if they do have suggestions I'm secretly irritated. So clearly it's just best for me to keep to myself and muddle along as best I can!

Wordswimmer: What's the part of swimming that you love the most?

Miller: Revising is my favorite -- I love to tinker. But in the meantime, I love it when I can look back on yesterday's or last week's work and discover it's not half so crummy as I thought after all.

For more information about Sarah Miller, you can visit her website:
www.SarahMillerBooks.com

And to read more interviews with Sarah, visit:
http://slayground.livejournal.com/230418.html
http://pajka.blogspot.com/2007/09/interview-with-sarah-miller-author-of.html
http://misserinmarie.blogspot.com/2007/06/interview-sarah-miller.html
http://embracingthechild.com/amiller.html
http://blbooks.blogspot.com/2007/11/becky-interviews-sarah-miller.html

Drawing Water From The Well

Some writers refer to the process of writing as drawing water from a well, hinting at a reservoir of words stored beneath the surface.

That well, like an underground aquifer, feeds our imaginations and drenches our words in the same way that underground streams secretly nourish the landscape.

And it's limitless--yes, limitless--but only if we acknowledge the well as a source and carefully replenish it.

To fill the well up, we may need to take frequent breaks from our work, or contemplate the words poured into the reservoir by other writers, or simply live our lives and let our experiences replenish the well.

The very same writers who describe writing as drawing water from a well often refer to priming the pump--another wonderful image--as a way of gaining access to this well of words.

To get started each day, many writers encourage words to flow by writing in a journal or by performing certain rituals, such as putting up a pot of coffee, meditating at one's desk, swimming a few laps in the local pool, or reading a few lines of poetry.

This confluence of hidden reservoirs and pumps, water and words, recently came to mind as I read Sarah Miller's first novel, Miss Spitfire, a spell-binding account of the fractious (at least in its early stage) relationship between young Helen Keller and her determined teacher, Annie Sullivan.

The story, retold from Miss Sullivan's point of view, offers readers a compelling portrait of a teacher struggling against enormous odds to help her reluctant student make the connection between the words that she spells with her fingers and the objects in the world that the words represent.

Not until five painful, torturous weeks after her arrival does Miss Sullivan finally see a change in her pupil:

I spell w-a-t-e-r, first slowly, then faster and faster as I work the handle. Suddenly a wide tongue of water gushes from the mouth of the pump.

"Wah--"

The sound twists into a gasp. She freezes. The mug drops, shattering on the packed dirt. Her hand clutches mine. She stands transfixed, her whole attention focused on the motion of my fingers.

I feel a change in the way she grips my hand. Her muscles, so often limp with indifference, strain to catch each movement. My chest heaves as I realize the difference. She's listening, with every bone and fiber.

Something is happening inside her head.

This is the miracle every writer hopes to experience each time we put our pens to paper and begin to tell a story, isn't it?

We try to "listen with every bone and fiber," and we pray (or hope... or trust...) something miraculous will happen inside our heads.

Most of the time we may take this miracle for granted. But this is a week of giving thanks, and Hellen Keller's story--especially as Sarah Miller tells it--is a timely reminder of the miracle of words and stories, as well as the miracle of relationships between teachers and students, writers and readers, family and friends.

Over the course of the year, we have been given words and stories, as well as friends and family with whom we can share our stories.

We have been given the ability to draw words from the well.

And, if we're lucky, we've been able to find the miraculous in our daily lives and in the lives of our characters.

All of our words and stories flow from this hidden well, this invisible aquifer stretching beneath the surface of our lives.

We have only to prime the pump and wait--perhaps with the patience of a Miss Sullivan--for the "tongue of water" to give voice to our imaginations.

Happy Thanksgiving, and thanks, as always, for stopping by.

For more information on Sarah Miller, visit: http://www.sarahmillerbooks.com/