Q&A with Shannen Malone
Shannen Malone’s A Shape for Daytime is a story that enchants from the very first page. It feels both nostalgic and fresh, quiet and decidedly outspoken. We’re delighted to share this interview with Malone and one of our editors, Laura Jensen. Join them as they dig into the story’s craft, as well as Malone’s writing process and affinity for dippers.
The nature writing in this story is so beautiful, and it makes so much sense for Noémi, in her isolation from people, to have such a keen eye for nature. Do you find yourself the same? Does nature often inspire you to write?
Very much so. Nature, being able to identify different species around me by sight or sound, learning how everything is adapted to its environment, and continues to adapt, it all feels very connecting. As a disabled person, the world can be very isolating. I think a lot of people discovered their own connection to nature during the pandemic, when able bodied people got a sense of what it would be like to live as someone disabled or ill, feeling far away from the world. Spending time connecting with nature helps bring it all closer, reminds us that we are part of the world, like any animal.
In writing, obviously a primary objective is to communicate ideas. Sometimes you can do that directly, but we lean on metaphors, on things that are like to relate experience or sensation. What do I know and you know that’ll let us meet in the middle and understand each other over this moment or concept? So it’s like pattern finding. And nature is so full of patterns when you look, things that aren’t equivalent maybe but that bear enough resemblance that you can know one thing through another; if you know a nautilus shell, you know a spiral galaxy. If you know a rose, you know the marks of a jaguar, and so on. To me, in life and in writing, nature is connective all the way down.
What is the significance of carving as an art form in this story? Why choose to have Noémi do this over sketching or painting? Is this something you have any personal experience with?
I have no carving or sculpting experience beyond a wheel pottery class I took as a child. I was not good. But I do remember it felt good. It’s earthy and messy, and it’s a very bodily medium, something you really put yourself into in a way I find fascinating. I respect all art mediums, but there is something about something like, say, Aardman animations, where things are tangible and handmade to the degree that when Gromit pulls a face, I can see the literal fingerprint of the person who spent hours and hours making it happen. I thought stone carving was similar, in the way it requires so much physicality, dedication, and time.
A Shape for Daytime feels reminiscent of old fairy tales, with the dark undertones and morals embedded within. It is memorable and moving and vibrant with imagery, it feels almost cinematic. What do you hope readers take away from your story?
I’m so glad that comes through, I did write it with the intention of it being a fairy tale. I’d hope that readers would pick up on the theme that makes it distinct from traditional fairy tales, which is the separation of what is monstrous/grotesque/ugly from what is evil or other. I wrote Noémi to be a Quasimodo figure, someone with more affinity with gargoyles than with people, and not necessarily by choice. She makes beautiful things, but her greatest masterpiece is something that frightens and disturbs.
Living in a time where our desire and love is being held hostage on the other side of commodity, types of bodies are “trends” or “fashions” and having pores is illegal, I’d like readers to take away some permission to be ugly. A suggestion to engage in discomfort, without imposing morality on it. And to go look at a cool plant or something.
The story is no longer written from Noémi’s perspective after Ariane didn’t meet with her. From then on, the story is read from the larger, outside perspective of Ariane and the townspeople. I found this so effective for the narrative, can you explain your strategy behind this switch?
After being perceived and rejected, I wanted to give Noémie some privacy, even from the reader’s eye, and also to allow her to present her work in way that it would speak for itself, without us having to accompany her through the process. The strategy was to give her a kind of ultimate agency in her story by allowing her to not tell it. We only get to see what she chooses to display.
Are there any specific authors or genres that inspire your writing?
I love things that futz with genre and are hard to definitively categorise or place. Weirdo books. Sarah Maria Griffin, Julia Armfield, Susanna Clarke – I think they’re making some of the most interesting work going, and I find their resistance to fitting neatly inspiring.
Lyrical writing styles are my favourite, I like when language earns its keep, so I find poetry and music inspiring as well in writing fiction. I like big feelings expressed through literary self reference, and quiet, sincere phrases. EE Cummings, Seamus Heaney, Florence Welch, Hozier.
As a writer, can you speak a little bit about your process? Are there any routines you have, places you like to write, etc?
Where I write is always a body decision. I have a desk and chair in my room, looking out the window over a river I live near. A lot of mind wandering happens there, and bird watching, but I find the ebb and flow of focus and distraction works better for me than trying to force periods of concentration. More often I actually write from bed, on a lap-desk tray. I know that’s frowned upon from both a “professionalism” side and a “sleep hygiene” side, but needs must, and waiting for ideal writing conditions rarely gets me anything but blank pages. And I like pyjamas.
In process, mechanically speaking, I start with a sort of word cloud. I just bullet point out concepts, the abstract ideas, isolated lines of dialogue without context – pile it all in. Then I go through them and see what pulls me on a given day and write in the space around it. I’ll repeat that every day, keeping connections between each part in mind as I go. I jump around and reorder, backtrack to seed things I want to come up later and that sort of thing. Eventually, everything’s stitched together and I’ve filled in all the holes, so I take a break from it for a few days and then edit it in a linear read.
If Noémi could carve you something, what would you want her to make?
A dipper. They’re one of my favourite birds. They bob up and down when they stand, and even though they’re a songbird, they hunt underwater. I like the way they move. If anyone could get that in stone for me, Noémie could.
