Grit Happens
On the face of it, a gothic western, influenced equally by Sergio Leone and Samuel Beckett, seems an unlikely candidate for a Booker Prize nomination. Patrick deWitt explains how he went about creating a minor modern masterpiece.
Roisin Dwyer, 31 Aug 2012
“It takes a lot of energy to work on a long project and that needs to regenerate every day,” says DeWitt. “So when plot and characters are in flux it’s more absorbing. Eli, for example, is a little bit of everything, much more fascinating to spend time with. It’s the same socialising, people who are really kind and always have a kind word are fine to spend time with – but it’s not nearly as interesting as someone who has ups and downs. It’s more interesting for me to go through a range of emotions and deeds.”
Currently on a literary residency in Paris with his wife and young son in tow, DeWitt has found himself between two projects. He has recently abandoned a contemporary tale of a corrupt investment banker he’d been working on, to concentrate on a dark fable about a young man who moves to a remote monastery.
“The guideline for me generally is that if something is dragging and I’m not having a good time I tend to become overly-critical,” he says. “I was struggling with the investment advisor story so for the time being I have stepped away and I’m working on the fable. It is a nasty story but it is a lot of fun and has my full attention right now. In terms of what is going to be the next novel I’m not really sure – but one of the two will win out.”
DeWitt struggled with the discipline of writing a screenplay, though he credits the innate restrictions of the form with the success of Terri.
“They are very different,” he says. “Fiction is much more expansive and you can really do anything you want to – whereas with screenwriting there are some really rigid rules and guidelines that you have to go by. Terri was my first screenplay but as I got into it I found the rules almost made it like a puzzle and it was actually kind of fascinating. It was also maddening at times because, with a book, you don’t really need to have a conclusion – it can just sort of end! I remember the end of Terri was really difficult and unpleasant: I was pulling my hair out. But I am happy with the end result, so I owe it to the rules for guiding me towards what now is the film.”
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Roisin Dwyer
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