Field Recordings welcomes Australian author Monisha Annabel Jador to the internet wilds. I hope you are relaxing and reading something meaningful to you this Labor Day Weekend. Jador is the author of Before You Were Born, children's verse about parenting, love, and wonder.
Name: Monisha Annabel Jador
Title: Before You Were Born
Where do you write?
I have four favourite places to write in. Java Lave cafe, at my favourite table, right in the corner, at the end. I love City Extra, as the moon dappled waters trickle beneath the parked ferries, just before the all night cafe, for the late nighters like myself, as they serve their tea, mine is Earl Grey with milk and try to tell me of their gluten free bread, fresh baked, to the smiles of the beautifully hearted staff, who know me by now. There is another place that I love to write in. A little cafe with an eclecticism that touches my heart on a sunny winter's morning as I write and finally a little tea house, set in Hornsby, NSW, Australia, that has inspired my second children's book.
What are your rituals with regards to writing (ex: Must have tea, a cat on the lap, etc)
I need to have a cup of French Earl Grey or just any tea loose leaf, and I must be seated at my favourite tables in any of these cafes.
Describe your writing process:
I prefer to write with music, even as the ideas come to me and then the story moulds into shape. Sometimes I find myself wrestling with the tales as I want it written in a certain way and then i feel the breath of the story and the pictures flow. The words feel and I write.
What do you when you begin to revise? What's the first thing you do during that process?
I look for words that are repetitive and then try to remove them or replace them with words of the same meaning. I see rhythm and feel flow, so the words must not jag with sharp angles. but if they have to, then I create a flow for the contrast. I also ensure that the story has a life. I am also one of my own worst critics at times. The main thing is the story is alive, shows its colours and speaks from its heart. I keep it that way.
When revising, how many drafts do you go through before you feel comfortable with the final product?
As I write for children, I would say three or four, but for my first one, I was comfortable with it straight away.
As a poet, whose music, or voice, sometimes do you hear as you write or revise?
The music just flows from somewhere as do the voices speaking my words, as I write. Many a time I hear the drawing irritation of my own mother's voice and its edge as it slices through my skin and bares my nerves, and dances on the very last of them as I write. I also see the large brown eyes that swallowed my name once, as I write.
How would you classify your poetry? Are you a lyric poet? A Romantic? A Surrealist?
I am not too sure. I guess I can be a lyrical, romantic poet. A surrealist, well, there might be some surrealistic tendencies in my poetry, but not much. Most of it is almost artistic, as I have been told.
What poets are you currently reading?
The poets on Goodreads just for now.
What poets/poems do you strongly recommend a reader to discover?
The poem from Seven Pillars of Wisdom. Passion, longing, lingering flame, beneath his touching gaze through his verse.
Where does your inspiration come from (music, film, other books)?
Life.
Explain how your local and regional environment influences your writing, your process, and your product (in other words, how does your reality intersect with the worlds that you create?)
Well, my environment moves my innermost feelings and needs, amongst desire. I grew up with pain, so I move words with pain. I know love so loves enshrouds my world. I know desire, abandonment, gender preference, racism, which was not always directed at me. I feel the name of my own background throbbing through my veins and I can hear voices of my past telling me to be proud of that one part of me, ignoring the others. I can hear their opinions from within me. However I smell the flicker of their fabric and spice of their scent, the warm sweet milk, freshly milked cows, a taste not forgotten, from that part of me as I taste the hot, nourishing stews and feel the tang of salads from Portuguese traditions and see the strong Dutch lines in our height, bloodline, all mixing with India in our vessels. The Irish eyes that sparkle from my daughter's smile and the hills of Ireland roll within my younger daughter's eyes are also aspects that move me.
You have to invite three authors to dinner, who are they? Why?
Charles, from Goodreads. He is fascinating. Kathy Lette, she is funny and of course Khaled Hosseini, his life in Afghanistan speaks of a love that the world rarely sees from the country. Of course if Lawrence of Arabia were alive, I would beg to make allowances. The five of us could have a feast filled with passion, wit, laughter, literary entertainment.
Favorite title (you wish you had come up with): There are too many to mention
Line you wish you wrote: There are too many, that paint pictures of a forlorn rose, darkened petals bleeding tears upon a lover's absconded heart.
Book you did not read in high school but now have read and have an appreciation for: And why: I was an avid reader in high school. However if I must, Seven Pillars of Wisdom. It beats within my heart now. Had I read it as a student, I would have rioted.
Favorite words: They are scattered through verse
Least favorite words: Maths.
Advice you would like to pass on to other writers: Write in the way that is yourself.
What you would discuss with your pet if your pet could talk: Life, his form. Her heart. Dreams, wishes.
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