Vera Nazarian Interview
Vera Nazarian is a 2007 nominee in the Nebula Short Story category for her story, The Story of Love. This is Ms. Nazarian’s first Nebula nomination.
Thanks for doing the interview. For those unfamiliar with your work, how did you get your start in the fantasy/science fiction genre? What’s changed since then?
I’ve been “writing in my head” for as long as I can remember, so this question, although valid, is a bit difficult to answer in a normal fashion. So forgive me if I blather on a bit…
I grew up with stories, and fairytales told to me and read to me, and long “epic” children’s books in verse in Russian that I’d memorized and went around quoting—Kradenoye Sontse (The Stolen Sun) comes to mind as one such favorite. It helped that my mother was a high school literature teacher back in Moscow, so books were valued above all things in my home. I learned to read around the time kids here in the West go to kindergarten but I know it was before first grade which I started a year early anyway (Mom had no babysitting options and basically petitioned to have me allowed to go to school when I was six instead of the usual seven, the age at which all Russian children started school in those days).
One of the earliest things I was given to read were ancient Greek myths and the Illiad
The way I started writing was somewhat convoluted. I’ve always said I’d be an artist, ("always" being 5 years and onward) and I drew and painted with the single-minded seriousness of a Parisian Academy Art student—minus Paris and the Academy… and okay, minus pretty much anything but an overpowering drive and desire to do art the classical proper way, acquiring painstaking skill. At the same time I’ve became a young person (six or seven year-young person) with opinions on everything, and so of course I had to express it. If anyone ever asked me why or how or what something was, I always had an answer, you see. An answer to everything, even if I had no idea really, but could make it up and improvise on the fly, and then embellish it with baroque imagination and pretty poetic metaphors, if applicable. And goodness, was it ever applicable! Seriously, Russians really love poetic metaphor, to the point that some westerners think they talk funny in the sense of how they turn a phrase and seem to pay exorbitant compliments to each other for very little apparent reason.
When my family and I came as refugees to the United States in the mid 70s, and I enrolled in the 5th grade, picking up the rest of my English skills, and going from ESL rudimentary to exuberant fluency in about two years, essay questions were my favorite things in the world. Whereas for most other kids in my class an assigned essay was a 5-paragraph act of torture, for me it was an official excuse to sound off—how could you not love that? After some efforts at shorter things (five paragraph essays that somehow acquired plot, especially the kind you wrote for detention to explain tardiness), I started to write a monumental epic fantasy novel, in a sort of friendly challenge with a friend, just as I entered junior high. No short stories for me, only the longest most arduous thing I knew of at that point, a real honest to goodness Tolkien-by-poundage trilogy. And no, I was not a writer, I was simply writing this one monumentally long epic fantasy.
I’ve always been a very businesslike kid. Since I’d had to do translation for my parents and fill out immigration and other official forms on their behalf, I’d learned to do things the “proper” way where it came to the business of writing. All this time of course I was reading ravenously in English and discovering the books of Andre Norton, Piers Anthony, Terry Brooks, J.R. R. Tolkien, Tanith Lee, Marion Zimmer Bradley, and the genre magazines. I begged my parents (who had very little money to spare) to subscribe to Writer’s Digest, and when that was unfeasible, copied market information by hand while sitting on the floor of a bookstore. Equipped with the arcane knowledge of how it’s done, I started submitting crappy things to different markets such as Asimov’s, F&SF, Fantasy Book, etc., using proper manuscript format. And if you’d asked me then, no, I was not a writer, I was simply submitting things I wrote so that they could get published.
And when I was a senior in high school, came my golden opportunity (also discovered in Writer’s Digest), to submit to Marion Zimmer Bradley’s Sword and Sorceress #2
Can you talk about your Compass Rose milieu? How did you envision such a setting?
In the beginning was the word… “Amarantea.”
Back in the mid 90s I’d written a couple of stories in an ancient middle-eastern flavored milieu, heavily influenced by the work of my favorite author Tanith Lee and all the huge background clutter of ancient epics and mythology. It never occurred to me to connect the stories into the same milieu. But once as I was in bed falling asleep, in that hazy lunatic state between sleep and wakefulness, when suddenly there was this word, in large deep red letters, standing up before my shut eyes like the name of a great deity, and then an image of a mysterious island surrounded by a distant ocean, an island between worlds. I knew nothing about it yet, but that somehow my gut was telling me this was all very IMPORTANT.
So at around 3:00 AM I bounded out of bed, grabbed a pen and jotted the word down on a scrap of an envelope, and then, because I was crazed, turned on the computer and typed the opening scene to the first story chapter of the future novel Dreams of the Compass Rose
Amarantea is too many things to mention, and in some ways impossible to explain; a mystery in many layers. And the novel works sort of backwards and in circular fashion—the first story is the end, and you have to read all the rest in order to discover the beginning. And then it all comes full circle, things suddenly snap into place, and the meta-story shape begins to flow like a self-contained ecosystem, a fountain of story stretching out and circulating itself across time and space. And the movement of this story fountain can be said to resemble a great shining compass rose.
Incidentally each chapter is a standalone story, but unlike The One Thousand and One Nights
I coined a term to call this structure—a “collage novel.”
Dreams
At some point Dreams
But earlier this year I’ve received good news. My novel will be reissued after all, by John Colby of Brick Tower Press, who bought out what was left of iBooks—to my understanding—and my title is apparently scheduled for a March 2009 release. More on that as it develops.
In the meantime I am working on another Compass Rose milieu book. Not a direct sequel (because there can be none, it’s a standalone mind puzzle-book, and the puzzle is resolved), but another, different puzzle-book novel, to be called GODS OF THE COMPASS ROSE. Once again it will be a collage of completely standalone stories that tie together into a greater meta-story, and this time I am exploring the notion of gods. Gods of all things, and mostly human properties of the mind such as love, loyalty, fear, wonder, despair, patience, deception, memory, courage, wisdom, illusion. And there is One Hidden God who rules them all. His story—the opening story of the new book, is in fact already written, and it is Three Names of the Hidden God published in the recent DAW anthology Heroes In Training
There are also two more story chapters completed, and one of them happens to be this year’s Nebula Award Nominee in the short story category, The Story of Love which explores the mystery of the god of love. Originally published in my collection Salt of the Air
Because of the structural and semantic complexity of these connected stories, I don’t envision the second novel to be completed for a few years at least. But I adore working in this mythic milieu, creating my own mythologies not based on any other culture, really, but based on my philosophy. Culture in this case is a veneer, while the true underlying mindset is ancient, timeless, and classic. It’s the whole ancient world at my metaphoric disposal!
How does it feel to have The Story of Love as a finalist for the Nebula? What was the inspiration for the story?
It felt wonderful and scary at the same time. In some ways I am glad it did not win because I got stage fright and didn’t have a speech, and might have been a complete mess if I had to go up there, and indeed it was an honor to lose to Karen Joy Fowler. Incidentally, I have Ellen Kushner, Connie Willis, Cynthia Felice, and a number of other kind people at my Nebula banquet table to thank, for not allowing me to pass out from sheer terror. My Nebula Weekend Trip is chronicled in detail here.
The inspiration for the story? Basically it was my need to explain the great mystery that is Love—that love is not what we think it is. That before love can be fully experienced, a person must allow themselves to love even those that he or she hates most. And that you cannot love half-way, but with the utmost fullness of your being, because you cannot do it until you open yourself completely to all manifestations of love, make yourself vulnerable and receptive. And… and… read the story.
Some of your stories tend to focus on language and evoking either a mythic or fable-like style. Why do you focus on those aspects of writing?
Easy answer—I tend to prefer delicate sharp beauty, elegance, and fine style. I think they lend weight to meaning. Just as a fancy dress can make a person look their best, so can words dress up a story.
Longer answer—each word in each human language is a glowing talisman empowered with meaning. When writing we can choose words at random, just enough to barely tell our tale. Or we can choose wisely and with subtlety—the ones that shine, sparkle and glitter best together, making up the most harmonious and balanced bouquet of verbal delight. A writer who places importance on style is like a person who is a sharp dresser—it’s not necessary but it makes a more powerful and memorable statement. In real life I am a bum who wears the same three t-shirts and pull-on pants, but in my writerly avatar I am a high courtier dressed at the height of fashion—or so I hope. Oscar Wilde is my paragon here.
What does it feel like to be the only Armenian-Russian speculative fiction writer (in English)?
A little weird, to be honest. I am not sure why more Armenian-Russian writers haven’t popped up out of the woodwork (just watch, tomorrow someone will show up to prove me Capitally Wrong). There are many Russian SF and fantasy writers writing in their native language back in Russia, and some in English here in the US (Ekaterina Sedia comes to mind) but I can’t think of any recent or contemporary Armenians who write, short of William Saroyan, and not any who write speculative fiction. I may be wrong: I hope I am wrong. Armenians are an imaginative, clever, adaptable, quick and joyful people, and the literature of imagination seems to be just the kind of thing they would embrace. Give it time, I say, and we’ll have an Armenian Tolkien. His last name will be “Tolkienian,” of course (inside joke, all Armenian last names end in “-ian” and occasionally “-yan").
On the other hand, I feel like a Middle Eastern leather merchant (don’t laugh, my great-grandfather was one) with a private key to a cultural treasure chest—I can dip into the rich ethnic tradition of Ancient Armenia and the great Kingdom of Urartu (which used to span most of Persia and Assyria in the old days, and some say Phoenicia too) whenever I please, and no one would know I am borrowing terms and words and notions. It’s all exclusively mine, I say. At least for the next five minutes. And if anyone wants their turn with it, “hametsek,” I say ("you’re welcome to it,” in Armenian).
Considering your familiarity with various languages, have you ever thought of writing speculative fiction stories in other languages?
I had considered it, but blessedly the madness came and left. I started to write something in Spanish once, and it was a bit like Don Quixote
What is it about fantasy and science fiction that you want to write in this genre?
I want to write the meaning of life into fiction.
Sounds grand and pretentious but in fact it’s kind of what every writer wants to do but not always dares admit it, even to themselves. And because it drives us crazy not to do it, or at least to try.
Think about it: many people claim they are simply telling stories, or practicing a craft. After all, professional writing is a job, isn’t it? And just as many other people are on the opposite end, claiming they are engaging in High Art, which is the reason their fiction is often clad in an iridescent scale-coat of literary imagery and sophistication, beautiful words scattered in barely-connected collages of meandering verbosity with just glimmers of an end-point. Sometimes these same people can be found writing in coffeeshops and attending high-end workshops. Nothing against coffeeshops or workshops in general, but sometimes—and let me emphasize sometimes, before half the coffeshop-frequenting, workshopping blogosphere jumps on my back in an orgy of righteous outrage—they really act as vehicles of superficiality and veneer for people who are deluding themselves about why or what writing really is. Writing is neither a grand art nor a skilled craft, but a vehicle for psychological exposition. It’s a human voice frozen forever in a meaningful mosaic of words—yours and mine—for future generations, or simply for anyone else to experience.
Now, getting back to the idea of “writing meaning into fiction.” Why, you might ask, not choose a different genre, or mainstream, or even expository non-fiction? If I so terribly want to “preach,” why not just be a loud-mouthed prophet on a streetcorner or an information superhighway modern version of such, a blog? Because, meaning is best presented as an entertaining, emotionally involving human story with an arc or progression spanning a beginning, middle and end, clad in bright metaphor of the imagination—the more wondrous, the better the “lesson” of the story “sticks.”
Some claim that there are no lessons to be taught or learned. That life is just a conglomeration of random patterns and we as proper Qool Kidz must merely laugh ruefully and make witty sarcastic observations on this pit of wretched despair called existence that surrounds us.
Regardless of whether or not it is, I choose to think that lessons are fun! They serve us much better than pointless barbs of despair disguised in nihilistic wit. And cause and effect rule, not just in the short-term sense, but they stretch out all the way into the infinity of the past and the future, making lovely ordered patterns despite the clamor of human suffering and the rise and fall of bloody civilizations. And furthermore, patterns per se cannot exist at all in a random universe because the repetition of even a single detail is impossible on a sub-atomic level without a blueprint, probability and statistics be damned. Statistics itself makes no sense until we can assign true limits, measure the full scope of the universal subject pool which happens to be the whole universe, and we cannot ever measure that, no matter how much we estimate and estimate… And yeah, in case you wonder, I studied stats, and this is what I came away with.
Furthermore, just the fact that we have DNA, the blueprint for living organisms, is enough to prove to me that the universe is an ordered entity. And even if I’m wrong, it’s the more optimistic thing to do, and I am as optimistic as the sun in zenith over the Equator. As far as I’m concerned, pessimism is a copout, a way of throwing up one’s hands and just becoming one with entropy; a dull boring clod, even if one is dressed in dark saturnine elegance.
Thus speaks the jolly Armenian in me.
Supposedly Armenians are a funny combination of pragmatic common sense and wild optimism (while Russians are melancholy dreamers), and it certainly trumps the Dostoyevsky-somber Russian half of my own genes. Or maybe it just tempers me in a humorous way. Just think of me as Dostoyevsky in an Elton John bling outfit running the casino instead of passionately gambling away his hard-earned soul money while dressed in pre-revolutionary workman rags.
Who are some of the people that have been influential to you and your writing career?
My mother started me reading, but then the rest can be said of every single author whose work I’ve read in any language. Seriously, this is an impossible question. But I would like to highlight George Sand, Stendhal, Charlotte Bronte, Oscar Wilde, and the Russian classics, in addition to the ancient Greek myths that still run in my blood together with Russian black tea.
As far as modern writers, I bow in humble awe to the mistress of dark beauty, Tanith Lee, kiss the hem of Gene Wolfe’s jacket, raise my voice in song to the faerie master himself, Charles de Lint, and owe an impossible debt of love and gratitude to Marion Zimmer Bradley who “discovered” and nurtured me as she did dozens of other writers of my generation.
What was the biggest challenge you needed to overcome in order to become a “professional” author?
Well, learning to speak and read English was a nice first hurdle. Never learning to type properly and getting by with four fingers (and only being given a typewriter by a nice Armenian businessman who liked a silly poem I wrote) was not a small thing at all. Having no money sucked; try submitting stories and buying paper and postal supplies when your family cannot afford food or clothing, much less a typewriter or money for summer school to take typing.
What helped with these obstacles? Discovering the fact that I have an opinion on everything was like installing a turbo-charged rocket in my ambition. Persevering because I was an insanely confident thinker was the clincher.
And then…
Making the first sale is always a huge hurdle. Making the second is another hurdle. Making the third is yet another, making the fourth… Seriously, it never ends. It only gets more routine and sometimes just plain sad when opportunities or markets slip away or rejections come in to smack you on the nose.
These days when I get a rejection, I am more likely to say “meh” and move on without feeling my blood pressure go up. Though, there are always exceptions. The one difference is, I know this is not just all one big accident (again, probability be damned and that—being that this is an ordered universe—I am in the middle of a repeating pattern. The pattern is in my favor because I chose to make myself a part of it—by trying damn hard and by working with it as opposed to against it).
Aside from writing fiction, you’ve also branched out into other areas such as art, music, and publishing! Which one are you currently prioritizing and how do you juggle your diverse skill set? How does one profession affect the others?
These days I am definitely a freelance jill-of-all-trades in publishing. Publishing other people’s books through my own independent press is what I am doing now to pay the bills, and writing has been temporarily put on hold.
The way it happened is, I’ve been doing freelance publishing work for other people for several years, starting in the late nineties, in additional to my high tech day jobs, and to the writing. And after the last round of layoffs in 2002 it occurred to me that I might as well try to work for myself, and the fact that there was a housing market boom helped me get a start by refinancing my mortgage. In 2006, seeing how well my friend and fellow writer and publisher Alan Rodgers was doing with his own POD publishing company Aegypan, I started Norilana Books, publishing mostly public domain classics, using a POD model through Ingram’s Lighting Source. Norilana Books currently has over 170 books in print, and specializes in beautifully packaged hardcover and trade paperback classics of world literature, quality fantasy, science fiction, romance and women’s fiction, and young adult titles.
The business is growing steadily but it is a whole lot of unimaginable work, and I seriously need to be cloned.
Meanwhile, I am very lucky to count among “my” authors such wonderful writers and editors as Sherwood Smith, Modean Moon, William Sanders, Catherynne M. Valente, Ken Rand, John Grant, Mike Allen, Roby James, Eugie Foster, JoSelle Vanderhooft, Lee Martindale, David Dvorkin, Leonore Dvorkin, Rochelle Uhlenkott, Deborah J. Ross, Rosemary Hawley Jarman, Elisabeth Waters, the Marion Zimmer Bradley Literary Works Trust, and last but not least, my muse and inspiration, Tanith Lee. Oh, and if I forgot anyone, please slap me hard.
And luckily, art, my early career aspiration, now has an outlet—in cover design. Yes, these days I still design 99.9% of the covers for Norilana Books, and must secretly admit it’s one of my favorite parts of the book packaging process.
And music? Well, not much has been happening recently on that front, but just out of the blue here is a song recorded a couple of years ago, a Celtic-style acapella piece—I wrote the music and lyrics, performed and recorded it myself; listen and enjoy, my friends. http://www.redroom.com/audio/a-bonnie-witch-named-gwen
What other projects are you currently working on?
I have several novels in various stages of completion. My most recent and vital project is a period-flavored fantasy novel COBWEB BRIDE, which, even as we speak, is threatening to turn into a trilogy. By golly, yes, it just did! Turned before your very eyes—share my moment. So, voila! A trilogy in the making, with book one being COBWEB BRIDE, book two COBWEB LOVERS and book tree, COBWEB FOREST.
The premise is that in an alternate sixteenth-seventeenth century Europe, in an imaginary Realm (which partakes of French, Italian and Spanish cultures), Death’s avatar comes into the world in the form of a mysterious man and all dying stops suddenly; he is asking for his Cobweb Bride to be brought to him, and until then, no one will find relief in oblivion. The repercussions, as you can imagine, are horrifying because death is a necessary part of the lifecycle. This novel is a romantic fantasy in the vein of Anne Bishop meets Patrica McKillip meets Jacqueline Carey, with battling armies of the undead, mysterious black knights hunting for all trespassers in a frozen waste, glittering imperial courts, star-crossed lovers, traitors and spies and courtly intrigue, and Percy, my ungainly ordinary peasant girl heroine who sets out on a quest to bring relief to her painfully dying old grandmother by traveling to the farthest northern Forest in search of Death’s Keep.
Book one is about two-thirds done, but in the meantime I’m getting very sick of working like a whole platoon of people doing book packaging, promo and marketing, editing, copyediting, data entry, shipping, bookkeeping and accounting, website work, programming, cover design, blogging, and everything else imaginable—when I should be writing too, but I can’t, not until I have something concrete paid to me upfront… Like a real advance, folks.
And so I’d love to sell these books, on partial, to a major publisher—any takers?
VERA NAZARIAN immigrated to the USA from the former USSR as a kid, sold her first story at the age of 17, and since then has published numerous works in anthologies and magazines, and has seen her fiction translated into eight languages. She made her novelist debut with the critically acclaimed Dreams of the Compass Rose
CHARLES TAN is a speculative fiction fan from the Philippines. He has lots of online doppelgangers, including a Singaporean politician and a Filipino basketball player, but people should be warned that the “real” Charles Tan is a bibliophile who stalks his favorite authors. His blog, Bibliophile Stalker is updated with daily content including book reviews, interviews, and essays. He is also a contributor for SFF Audio.
