Below is a mini-interview between Karina Magdalena Szczurek and Bridget Pitt, author of the short story “Paper Nautilus”, featured in the 2023 Short.Sharp.Stories anthology, Fluid.
Bridget Pitt has published poetry, short fiction, nonfiction and four novels. Her nonfiction work includes co-authoring Black lion, the memoir of Sicelo Mbatha, a spiritual wilderness guide. Her latest novel, Eye brother horn (Catalyst Press, 2023), explores the social and ecological impacts of colonialism in South Africa. Her work has been shortlisted for, among other awards, the Commonwealth Book Prize and Short Story Prize, and the Wole Soyinka African Literature Award. She says of her story: “I came across a little dead paper nautilus on the beach. Something about its vulnerability, its small size, its form, brought to mind a young mother in a flowing white skirt with blue flowers. The story evolved from there.”
KMS: You are a versatile writer who switches between fiction and nonfiction and the long and short forms. What attracts you specifically to the short story?
BP: I find writing short fiction quite challenging, as it requires so much discipline, so I haven’t written that much of it. But a well-constructed short story is a magical thing, able to convey whole lives and complex relationships in a few pages, and I’ve really enjoyed the challenge of attempting to capture these in the short stories that I have written. I also enjoy the fact that they are short, that you are not immersed in the process for years on end, which is what has happened with most of my novels.
KMS: Your story in Fluid, “Paper nautilus”, has a tragic family event at its centre. Its repercussions are felt in the next two generations of the family. Do you believe that we can heal trans-generational trauma through telling stories?
BP: I believe that storytelling is one of the oldest, most powerful healing mediums we have. Storytelling has always been a way of making meaning of our lives, and of processing what has happened to us, individually and collectively. Many of the traditional stories that have been passed down orally, that are still passed down in some communities, emerged through processing traumatic events that the family or community had experienced.
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Storytelling has always been a way of making meaning of our lives, and of processing what has happened to us, individually and collectively. Many of the traditional stories that have been passed down orally, that are still passed down in some communities, emerged through processing traumatic events that the family or community had experienced.
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Writing has been very cathartic for me, and has offered a way to process difficult or traumatic issues in my own life, and in the lives of my parents and grandparents. And reading stories has always given me the insight, compassion and resilience I need to heal from tough experiences – I hope my writing can do the same for other readers. One of the best comments someone made to me about my last novel was that it really helped them cope with their own mother’s dementia.
KMS: Your latest novel, Eye brother horn, also looks at the past to examine its influences on our present. Can you tell us more about the social and ecological aspects of colonialism the novel explores?
BP: The social impacts of colonialism have been extensively portrayed in literature, the ecological aspects perhaps less so. I set out to explore the ecological violence perpetrated by colonialism, but the more I did that the more I realised how entangled it was with the social and economic violence. What interests me in particular is how the forces of history play out in the day-to-day lives of people. How do they experience themselves and each other? What is their understanding of the role they are playing in the greater political movements of the time? The novel explores how the relationship between a missionary and the community he was trying to convert played out in everyday interactions; how he justified to himself the total denial of a community’s lived reality, belief system and sense of self that conversion to Christianity demanded; how he later justified to himself his support of violence against this community by the British.
The story also features a wealthy landowner, exploring how his sense of entitlement, and his belief in his right and obligation to wield authority, play out in his relationships with others – in the way he relates to the land, and in the casual, almost compulsive way he slaughters the wild animals he encounters. And, crucially, the novel explores the love of two brothers, the complexity of love between siblings who were not born equal in the eyes of their society, and what it takes for them to resist the colonial agenda of conquest, dehumanisation and expropriation.
KMS: What kind of research was required for you to write the novel?
BP: A lot! I read widely – historical analyses, but also personal diaries, logs, annals and letters. I spent time in the area, in the battlefields and old mission stations, and hiking in the iMfolozi wilderness. I read anthropological accounts and consulted Zulu speakers on language, history and culture. The novel took a long time to write because I needed to accumulate a bedrock of knowledge and understanding, an organic feel for the time and place, before I could even start growing the characters and the plot.
KMS: When I read your prose, I can feel the poet at work. Tell us more about your creative process.
BP: I work quite visually. I have done a lot of visual art and sculpture. Particularly in the early stages of a novel, I do a lot of mixed media and process-oriented art making, which helps open me to the more unconscious, dreamlike manifestations of narrative, place and characters. I often dip into a poem before I write, to keep myself in that liminal in-between space, something like the alpha brainwave state where you are between sleep and waking.
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I work quite visually. I have done a lot of visual art and sculpture. Particularly in the early stages of a novel, I do a lot of mixed media and process-oriented art making, which helps open me to the more unconscious, dreamlike manifestations of narrative, place and characters.
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Writing can take you into a very prosaic headspace where everything is literally spelt out. This can be scary, especially when you are trying to feel your way into a character who is very different from you. Working with poetry and art helps you step out of your own skin and into someone else’s.
KMS: When did you know that you would become a writer?
BP: I started writing young – the first poem I wrote for myself, not a school assignment, was when I was about seven. I was always making up stories in my head, even if I didn’t write them all down. I was constantly narrating my life to myself in the third person (she stood, gazing out at the rain, wondering whether her life would ever make sense, etc). It was like I had an invisible author madly recording every moment, and trying to endow it with some kind of consequence or profundity. I discovered my mother’s typewriter when I was about ten, and bashed out tragic tales of lost dogs and ghost stories of bullied children who’d died and come back to haunt their tormentors, and later dreadful sagas of doomed young lovers. I had a penchant for melodrama, which I’ve had to tussle with as an adult writer. However, this compulsion to tell stories never seemed like a very sensible career, and I pursued other interests on leaving school. It still doesn’t feel like a very sensible career, but I’ve (mostly) given up resisting it. So, I’d say I’ve always known I’d become a writer, and simultaneously I still doubt whether I’ll ever satisfy my own criteria for being a “real” writer.
KMS: What motivates you to enter writing competitions such as Short.Sharp.Stories?
BP: A competition deadline is a good motivation to get me to write short fiction. I sometimes have ideas for a story, and I might put a few thoughts down, but I seem to need an extra push to manifest these. Most of my stories have been written in response to a competition call, or being invited to contribute to an anthology. I also loved the theme of this year’s Short.Sharp.Stories – it grabbed me as soon as I heard it, and I felt I just had to write for it.
KMS: Do you have a favourite short story writer, local or international?
BP: I have many writers whom I enjoy. The first short story writer I really connected with was Roald Dahl – he was a master at structure, suspense and the wicked twist in the tale that is so evident in his children’s books. Hilary Mantel has written some brilliant stories, with all the wit, insight and erudition found in the Wolf Hall series. Zimbabwean author Petina Gappah is a phenomenal short story writer – her collection An elegy for Easterly was an insightful and compassionate reflection on life under Robert Mugabe. There is a story called “Fragments” by Kenyan author Yvonne Adhiambo Owuor, about a conversation between a filmmaker and a soldier in the DRC, which still haunts me. I read or listen to a lot of short fiction. So many stories have moved me over the years, that it is hard to choose a favourite.
KMS: What are you working on currently?
BP: I have been writing quite a few opinion pieces exploring the links between colonialism and our current environmental and social justice crises. And I am exploring a joint novel with my friend Sicelo, set in contemporary KwaZulu-Natal, exploring the social and environmental impact of coal mining, among other things.
Also read:
Short.Sharp.Stories anthology Fluid: interview with Keith Oliver Lewis, author of “Blue Boy Lagoon"
Short.Sharp.Stories anthology Fluid: interview with Vuyokazi Ngemntu, author of “Mirror, Mirror"