Ask the Author: Marie White Small
Answered Questions (7)
Marie White Small
My favorite romantic couple in literature is from Michael Ondaatje's The English Patient, set in an abandoned Italian villa during WWII. In the story, Hana the Canadian nurse cares for “the English Patient,” a man who was severely burned and is unrecognizable, though in demeanor seems continental—assumed to be English. He is actually the Hungarian Count Laszlo Almasy, the doomed devotee of Herodotus and the once lover of British intelligence officer Geoffrey Clifton’s wife, Katharine. The question remains: Was Almsay a spy for the Germans?
As Hana quietly and humanely begins to understand her charge’s story, she too falls in love. Unlike the English patient, Hana freely loves Kip, and he is, for a while, enraptured with her, though he is always enigmatic, hidden behind a wall, a sheet, a door to another world. He is an Indian Sikh in the British Army, enamored with his superior Lord Suffolk, and in nearly all apparent ways, welcomed into Suffolk’s family. Both are trained as sappers, bomb-defusers. Tragically, Suffolk is killed trying to unravel an explosive device, and Kip is devastated. He joins the European theatre, where he meets Hana and eventually leaves her as well, rejecting western culture and values.
The love stories in this novel are about people who seem to have a clear sense of who they are, and they operate independently. For the most part, their love relationships lack that all too common cloying clinginess that seems so commonly depicted. These characters make choices, particularly the couple of Hana and Kip, from convictions and self-realization. I also appreciated that their love had a socially forbidden element, which in contemporary times moves toward greater appetence.
Life often does not work out as we would wish it to; nor does love. I finished this read feeling that the characters were better for having loved as they did, bittersweet as it was.
There are lessons here to emulate.
My favorite romantic couple in literature is from Michael Ondaatje's The English Patient, set in an abandoned Italian villa during WWII. In the story, Hana the Canadian nurse cares for “the English Patient,” a man who was severely burned and is unrecognizable, though in demeanor seems continental—assumed to be English. He is actually the Hungarian Count Laszlo Almasy, the doomed devotee of Herodotus and the once lover of British intelligence officer Geoffrey Clifton’s wife, Katharine. The question remains: Was Almsay a spy for the Germans?
As Hana quietly and humanely begins to understand her charge’s story, she too falls in love. Unlike the English patient, Hana freely loves Kip, and he is, for a while, enraptured with her, though he is always enigmatic, hidden behind a wall, a sheet, a door to another world. He is an Indian Sikh in the British Army, enamored with his superior Lord Suffolk, and in nearly all apparent ways, welcomed into Suffolk’s family. Both are trained as sappers, bomb-defusers. Tragically, Suffolk is killed trying to unravel an explosive device, and Kip is devastated. He joins the European theatre, where he meets Hana and eventually leaves her as well, rejecting western culture and values.
The love stories in this novel are about people who seem to have a clear sense of who they are, and they operate independently. For the most part, their love relationships lack that all too common cloying clinginess that seems so commonly depicted. These characters make choices, particularly the couple of Hana and Kip, from convictions and self-realization. I also appreciated that their love had a socially forbidden element, which in contemporary times moves toward greater appetence.
Life often does not work out as we would wish it to; nor does love. I finished this read feeling that the characters were better for having loved as they did, bittersweet as it was.
There are lessons here to emulate.
Marie White Small
I Have a new novel in the works, titled, There Were Wolves in Poland. It is about a disgraced newspaper man and four eccentic women who live on an island off the coast of Maine.
Marie White Small
Stop planning when, where, and how to write. Stop reading advice books. Just write, and then write some more. Then write every day. Join a writer's group online or in person, and listen to the critique, but know your own voice and stay true to that voice.
Marie White Small
I write to be heard; it is that simple!
Marie White Small
Reading for me seems to open up blocked channels, after all reading is what inspires many to become authos
Marie White Small
I was an avid reader early on and loved writing as a child, though I wrote for my own pleasure. With age comes wisdom and something more significant to offer to the world.
Marie White Small
Years ago there was a personal tragedy that involved gun violence in my extended family and I felt compelled to write about the long term consequences.
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