SeniorLearn

The following questions and responses were generated during a SeniorLearn discussion of the book, Major Pettigrew's Last Stand.

Q. Can you tell us what inspired you to write this book? Was it a personal story that had to be told, or was it something else?

A. I wanted to write something just for me instead of something 'edgy' that would get me published. When I wrote just for me, with no censor, my mind went home to Sussex and up popped the Major in his dead wife's flowered housecoat! The Major in his wife's housecoat was an act of imagination - and no it would be VERY unusual to see a man cleaning his house in this garment. I used it for this reason - but truthfully, images often come to my mind fully formed and this was one such case. I have never seen a housecoat with a clematis pattern, as far as I know, but I saw it as clear as day in my mind.
While I miss home, I also miss my family and perhaps I was thinking of my parents when the Major opened the door. However, I was also eager to use the standard village setting and a cast out of an Agatha Christie mystery on Public Television - and then start taking them apart layer, by layer to show their individuality and also life in contemporary England. It's not all cream tea and roses these days!

Q. When you thought of the major as your protagonist did he come full blown into your mind or did you discover him layer by layer?

A. It turns out that if I have a 'gift' or more likely a small 'window' into the writing process it is that characters present themselves to me, coats on, handbags on the elbow, waving a bus ticket and demanding that I accompany them somewhere they need to be. I do not outline or know where I'm going - I only catch a glimpse of someone turning a street corner and hurry after them.

Q. How do you know so much about what goes on in the mind of a 68 year old man? Perhaps the Major is based on someone you know?

A. Writing as a 68year old man was very useful - it kept me from becoming too sentimental when trying to write a looove story! Now, at 47, I can see that people think they are the same person at 29 and at 68, and at 90, so I didn't try to write him as especially 'old'.

Q. Have you personally discovered big differences between your age group and the Major's age group?

A. On the topic of age. I feel I stand on the ridge of a hill and can see back to my twenties and forward to the days when I shall receive my meals-on-wheels and order my books in large print from the library. I may know more as I age, but I am the same person as well. I am Helen the small child, the awkward teen, the mother - and I can see me really working on being fit enough to keep traveling. I do have experience working with frail elder adults and I can tell you, they always felt perfectly young - only sometimes the body betrayed them and other people thought them invisible. I hope I could sit and have a lovely chat with you at 75. I know we'd have more to talk about than I do with my sons - who are monosyllabic teens right now!

Q. How did you come to know about the Churchills well enough to feature these guns in your story?

A. I rented a cottage in Sussex and the farmer next door showed me and my small children his prize shotgun. It was beautiful (and no, I'm not a fan of guns) and as I complimented him on it he said, rather sadly, 'my brother in Australia has the other one.' Loss of brother and gun seemed to show equally in his face and I tucked the image away. When the Major appeared, it seemed clear to me that he too owned a single shotgun from a pair.

Q. Do you remember which came first when you first thought of the story, the Churchills or the Major, who appears to epitomize the shooting culture of E.J Churchill?

A.I had to research everything about shotguns and duck shooting as I am as diametrically opposed to blood sports as one could imagine. The joy of writing the Major was trying to see the world from his very different point of view. Perhaps our congresspersons and senators should give this a try as they negotiate budgets and debt ceilings!

Q. Did you have any personal first-hand knowledge of Indian/Pakistani relations or is it all from research?

A. No I am not 'qualified' to write about Pakistani heritage from any first hand knowledge - but I write to ask myself questions and to explore what I do not know. I did a lot of research - from academic studies on chain migration to message boards of young Pakistani people in the UK - and I was pleased to find that families are mainly the same the world over. We all have mother-in-law issues or funny aunts or long-winded siblings, don't we? We have more that unites us than we know, and a conservative Muslim family may have more in common with an evangelist Christian family than with,say, a liberal New York family of no religious background.

I'm thrilled with the quality and depth of the discussion on this board. I want to tell you that yesterday I spoke to a group in MD that is primarily a monthly community group of South Asian families and is for all immigrant families to come together and hear speakers on topics of use to families discovering life in America and dealing with all the school, friends and family issues. These were all professional people and I was delighted at how frankly they were willing to address the issues in my book. They all seemed to think I had done a reasonably good job at depicting Mrs. Ali and her family and I was very relieved. I could have spent hours exploring with them the unlimited variations in who people are. We all seemed to agree on how terrible it is that people get clustered as 'populations' or 'groups' and that their individuality gets lost. This goes for 'English' people as well.

Q. Did you have to do much research for your book -- about the guns, and the Mughal Empire, etc.?

A. I love research. I can not believe that the New York Public Library and the Library of Congress will give me a photo ID and let me use their marble halls, oak desks and the services of library personnel. Librarians fetch your books! In London, the British Library Colindale (for newspapers) will hold your laptop while you go to lunch! This is the epitome of enlightened society - that we the people own and have access to these mansions of learning. What a privilege!

Q. Where had the Major served when in the military? And secondly, did his military service influence his personality?

A. The Major participated in the British army's "Small Wars" as one web site calls the post world war II era. There were many 'police actions' and so on to places like Aiden, Suez and they are largely forgotten. The USA has also experienced this diminution of respect for some conflicts over others. People do not remember Korea like they now acknowledge Vietnam (I think???). The Major was very much an 'information' man and an army bureaucrat and I wrote lots of back story in which he saved men and resources through efficient filing systems. Alas such back story can weigh down a tale and I dropped most of it.

Q. Can you tell us the reason Frank Ferguson refers to Lord Dagenham as "Double D"? Are these his initials?

A. Yes, Dagenham's initials are DD and his aristocratic-sounding name is the name of an English industrial town where they make cars!

Q. Do Edgecombe St. Mary and Hazelbourne-on-the-Sea really exist or are they purely fictitious?

A. The towns are fictitious amalgamations of places I know and love.

Q. I recently read, and found most interesting, your review of Paula McLain's The Paris Wife. Are there any writers, not necessarily whom you would like to emulate, but whose particular style you admire?

A. My favorite author is Edith Wharton. I also admire Somerset Maugham and I love Toni Morrison, Barbara Kingsolver, David Mitchell, Ian McEwan...the list goes on. What I loved about the "Paris Wife" was that I am usually very hard on unfaithful men, but this book made me see that Hadley made her own bed when she married Hemingway. She knew it, she had her own reasons to take the bargain - and then she made the classic mistake of wanting to change Hemingway into a suburban dad. By the end, I could not find where my loyalties should lie and I thought that masterful.

Q. Can you comment on your own writing style, the detail, the metaphors so completely original...so many on every page.?

A. At one point my wonderful editor said that my metaphors were so beautiful...that I should really limit them to one per page! I tend towards wordiness and I delight in language and in finding new images to describe things. It's very English to steep oneself in language and back home all sorts of people delight in long words. In the USA we are Hemingway-direct and prefer the simple approach often. In the UK I fear we are all Mr. Pickwick at heart!

Q. When you decided on the title of your first novel, what did you have in mind as Major Pettigrew's LAST STAND? Do you agree that when he took a stand for himself and Jasmina, with the military pun intended. it was because of his military background?

A. Last Stand - it was an ironic play on the idea of the military hero (eg. Custer's Last Stand) and I always thought the Major would fail to make himself a hero when it counted. it was a pleasant surprise when he physically took a stand, on the cliffs, and when he overcame his natural reserve to make an unexpected leap for the brass ring of true love. Of course, the cover came later and is of a 'hat stand' so the book, in my mind, is now "Major Pettigrew's Last Hat Stand."
I also don't believe that life is made up of a few shining moments - first love, last chance - so I used the title as a counterpoint to a man whose true nobility lies in his ability to get up each day and try to make good on the personal failings of yesterday. Life is about slow perserverence not flashy stands.

Q. Helen, who found the cover photo?

A. The cover was found by the Random House art department and they deserve huge credit for making my cover an icon - other authors ask for a "Pettigrew" cover, I'm told.

Q. Your strong female characters, and men without consequence, bring to mind Barbara Pym's characters, who feel that love alone is not always enough reason for marriage. Have you read her novels?

A. I haven't read Barbara Pym - though I am oft recommended her books. I think she is probably too good at saying just what I would want to say and so I think I'll continue to steer clear.
I'm so glad you had discussion about Grace and what she represents. She sort of bumbled along representing herself. I sat for a long time over the scene of the Major's half-hearted marriage proposal. I thought it was his shabbiest moment and I really didn't know if Grace would say 'yes'. This would have caused me all sorts of problems but I was prepared to work around her answer. Her final answer was, I think, a good one. However, I do think it was an inspirational and aspirational answer in a grim world of too few decent men!! I got grief from many of my own friends over it.

Q. Are any of these characters stereotypes of the way women "ought to be"?

A. I'm glad you saw through my male hero to see my interest in strong women. However, the only way to write is to write individuals. The women just happened to come out strong in most cases. One of my favorites was Mrs. Rasool, running a business empire and trying to pretend she did not!
Most writers will be very unhappy if you ask whether their characters are stereotypes! Mrs. Ali's determination to support her nephew came from a deep maternal love. She did not have children of her own and I believe this caused her pain and that she regarded Abdul Wahid as a son. It was probably then painful when his parents got to decide everything and took him away for some years. I tried to access my own feelings for my sons whenever Mrs. Ali thought of Abdul Wahid. She is as strong as Sandy - she is just older, wiser and understands that compromise will happen - and that all the fervor in the world can not always make things happen the way you want. She represents the realism of age that young people find infuriating!

Q. Do you see the Major as a strong man?

A. I wrote the Major as a 'weak' man. People love him so much they ascribe him an overt nobility I don't really see. His nobility lives in his self awareness - something many people lack.

Q. Helen, the dry humor in the many quips from the Major are priceless - is this part of your personality or the personality of someone near and dear to you?

A. I was afraid that the dry humor was just a British thing and that I wasn't really being funny. I have been informed that I speak like my book reads and I am very grateful to be thought witty. I would prefer to be thought amazingly slender and outrageously beautiful but that is just not how it's going on my book tour.

Q. Did you intentionally portray men as annoying - unlikable - unbelievable, even? Ferguson and Roger for example? And let's not forget the Vicar..

A. I love Ferguson! In a world that contains Donald Trump, I believe Ferguson is a sensitive man, an artist of the brick and I was very happy to see him marry Gertrude and get the entree into British society that he so badly wanted. Meanwhile, Roger is my non-fiction character made up of stupid things I have said to my parents and habits I have observed in myself and my various hard-working ambitious friends. it is funny that the mere mention of fancy cars, penthouses and interior decorating make a character unlikable! Roger says nothing that you and I have not said or thought at some time! He is the brashest part of us all.
One thing I've noticed in producing this book is that when you write one individual, or one incident, it does tend to expand and be seen to represent the universal or the 'stereotype'. I'm not offended by the question - it is a decided hazard though, for a writer. I have had angry emails from individual Flower Guild Ladies, Private Equity employees and Americans - all accusing me of stereotyping an entire class of people. It is very hard to avoid as it is natural to look for patterns and representations in literature.

Q. And the Vicar? His reasoning against this mixed marriage upset quite a few. Can you tell us if you saw him mouthing Church teaching or expressing his own opinions based on what others might think? Was he, in fact, a stereotype?

A. I'm not up on Church of England dogma in particular but it does beg the question, doesn't it? If you believe only Jesus Christ can save souls, then where would that leave your Muslim wife? Certainly not in the graveyard which is consecrated ground for registered parishioners only. I was definitely taking a little poke at the C of E but this is actually an issue for all religions - if you practice in a conservative manner. I think in the USA, some of us like to gloss over whatever dogma does not suit us and I was very interested in what would happen if you tried to stick to dogma. Abdul Wahid represents this idea and he is tortured about his life. This is a BIG issue and I tried to keep it as small as possible in my book.
Did you really have a fight over the Vicar and feel outrage? I thought he was pointing out the obvious difficulty for a man of the cloth. There are similar difficulties for all our ministers over abortion, over same sex marriage and so on. I'm firmly on the side of 'anything goes' but I'm not an ordained minister responsible for maintaining faith standards.

Q. How do you see the Major and Jasmina in the future - will they attend the Vicar's church in the village? Will they be buried side by side in that little cemetery beside the church?
A. Unless Mrs. Ali converts to Christianity she will not be allowed a spot in the churchyard. She and the Major will have to be buried in the Municipal Cemetery in Hazelbourne-on-Sea. Which begs the question of whether the Major will be buried with Nancy or Jasmina? Which begs the bigger question...and here we go again off in a discussion about the nature of God. It's all quite exhausting, isn't it? Perhaps a cup of tea...

Q. Does George serve a special purpose here or represent anything in particular? His name, of course, is so very British, I wondered if perhaps he was a sign of better things to come for the Pakistani population.

A. GEORGE - yes, no accident in naming him after England's patron saint. He is the future of England, like it or not, and it was not a giant leap of imagination to heap the unanswerable future onto his slim and adorable shoulders. One can only hope for incremental improvement such that George will feel more of a sense of belonging to his own country that his parents or grandparents' generation felt.

Q. Is there a film in the works? So many of the scenes would translate well to film - the dance, the duck hunt, the scene on the white cliffs?

A. Yes, movie option signed. Now we just hold our breath for up to five years or so!!!!

Thank you so much, Helen! We appreciate your time and your candor in responding to our questions. We will surely be on the lookout for the movie, and for your next book as well.

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