Excuses, excuses || An interview with Caroline O'Donoghue
I’m so happy to be writing to you again!
I don’t have a particularly iron-clad excuse for why it’s been so long, but I do have two equally blancmange-clad excuses for you to choose from:
I’ve started a new job since my last letter, so I’ve been busy doing New Job Things, like having terrible ID photos taken. It was the age-old dance: I stood against a nearby wall while somebody from HR pulled out a digital camera from a desk drawer, I made my best effort to smile and stand extremely still. (I’m a statue! But I’m delighted about it!) The photographer looked at their handiwork and asked – unambiguously, but not without pity – if I wanted to ‘have another go’. I was too embarrassed to say yes, and thus the cycle repeated itself: I’m stuck with an ID badge that makes me look like a wombat with a secret.
Also to be filed under New Job Things:
Worrying that my email tone is too formal (or not formal enough??) and gently, gently testing the waters by adding an ever-increasing number of exclamation points.
Completing an ungodly amount of online training, featuring hundreds of not-at-all-terrifying questions like this:
10 is the correct answer, FYI. Never let it be said that this newsletter isn’t informative!
In case you’re wondering, I’m a music therapist in a hospital not, as that question might suggest, a scullery maid in Count Dracula’s castle.
The second, and significantly less acceptable reason for my radio silence is that the space bar is sticky on my laptop, and it makes me mash at the keyboard like an angry bear.
When I mentioned this to my sister, she said (and I quote) ‘Ew!’
I questioned this response. What ew? It’s just a faulty key!
‘Oh’ she said. ‘I just assumed you meant it had been covered in jam or something for a really long time.’
If I’m honest, I feel like I could have done without ‘a really long time’. (I haven’t been the recipient of such an incisive burn since my sleeping style was described as ‘hot and everywhere.’)
Anyway, the jammed (but - and I can’t emphasise this enough - jamless) space key makes me falter and stutter as I type, and I only typed with two fingers to begin with, so it’s an altogether Not Great typing situation.
With a space bar that sticks every other word or so, how can I possibly let my thoughts flow free and true? LET ALONE complete my Mavis Beacon typing course?
Look at her: so encouraging; so sure of my potential to get out of the doldrums of 27 words per minute! Poor, naive Mavis.
I like to think I’m a *little* more worldly than some touch-typing tycoons we know, so don’t worry: I don’t imagine that you’ve been frantically refreshing your inboxes since my last letter. But I’ve missed writing to you, so I’m sorry it’s been so long.
Not least because I now realise that my excuses can be boiled down to the first line of any great resume: ‘busy at work and bad at typing’.
I’d been stewing over a different sort of email the other day; the sort you put off for days and weeks, unsure of what to say, or how to say it. And my dad - infuriatingly wise as always - reminded me that it’s better to reach out with something small and true than nothing at all. ‘Don’t let perfection be the enemy of the good’ he said. Doing your best is plenty for today.
So I sent the email, and now I’m sending this one.
A Poem
Two weeks ago I went to my dream poetry reading, partly because I am a non-stop culture vulture, and partly because my friend Rebecca Tamás was reading, and she was opening for Hera Lindsay Bird.
(‘Opening for’? Is that what poetry people say? I realise this question may leave my status as a non-stop culture vulture in tatters.)
Rebecca writes about women and the occult, and she always, always wears red lipstick. Her poetry - as you can imagine - is beautiful, hot-blooded, and luminous. If we weren’t already friends, I would have been star-struck to meet her.
Unfortunately for me, Hera Lindsay Bird and I were not already friends, so when I met her before the reading, I played it cool by telling her that she’s my favourite poet, and I adore everything she’s written.
After the reading, which had buffed the edges of my heart like blue and green, wave-smooth sea glass, I asked her to sign my book.
‘Is it for you or for a frie-’
‘IT’S FOR ME PLEASE MAKE IT OUT TO KATYA.’
‘Sure! And you’re a poet too, right?’
I narrowed my eyes, trying frantically to think of something to say, but what I opted for in the end was apparently just looking at her for a really long time.
‘……no.’
Hera, persistent and generous:
‘Oh, I thought I heard someone say you were a writer?’
Me, knowing that she had me 100% mistaken with someone else, but still sorely tempted to be seen by Hera Lindsay Bird as a fellow poet, even if only for a brief, shining moment:
‘……..’
Still me, realising in real time that her reading had left me with all the eloquence of a mollusc:
‘No …. I’m - I’m not one.’
I’m telling you this - about a vaguely embarrassing encounter with someone I admire enormously - because I’m about to copy in my favourite poem by Hera Lindsay Bird, and I want you to know that if you find yourself a little bit lost for words, I’m clearly right there with you.
Having Already Walked Out On Everyone I Ever Said I Loved
I pause for a moment at your door
And consult my fate
This life is more stupid than even I could have hoped for
Every day a search party gets lost in the snow
With no-one to dig them out again
I have tried for too long to act in ways that seem reasonable
Yet somehow, this makes me double-unreasonable
Like flicking someone’s bra-strap at a coroners inquest
The official theme of this poem is
The official theme of all my poems which is
You get in love and then you die
O write it in rhinestones on the lid of my coffin
Some people are too hard to be lived without
Once upon a time I used to feel like............huh
But then I started to feel a little more like..................................uhuh
Once upon a time I used to feel like.................??
But then I started to feel a little more like.................................????????
Having already walked out on everyone I ever said I loved
Things do not bode well for you
But things do also not bode well for me
Every year life gets less and less acceptable
And I feel uncertain of how to proceed in an appropriate fashion
To anticipate heartache is a grim satisfaction
Like tripping down a staircase in a peach negligee
Or an ancient forest with a new corsage of flames
It pleases me to subject myself to such whimsical hurt feelings
But under my main feelings, I have other, worse feelings
Like an auxiliary moat in which black swans are circling
If I ever die young I’m going to do it in style.....like a Great Gatsby themed suicide attempt!
Having already walked out on everyone I ever said I loved
I have so little left to say to you
I pause for a moment at your door
My eyes pouring out across the darkness
O let us not be little bitches to one another
Life is hard enough as it is
Life is hard enough and fast enough
And there is nothing in this world worth doing
But shaking our heads in awe
A new wind shifts the branches
A bird flies out of the radio and off into silence
I can hardly believe this
I can hardly believe this life
Every time I knock you let me in
from HERA LINDSAY BIRD (Victoria University Press, 2016; Penguin, 2017).
I cannot recommend this book highly enough. It’s a cobweb-clearing, heart-scrubbing masterpiece, and is worth buying for the first two lines of the blurb alone:
this impressive debut has established Hera Lindsay Bird as a good girl…..……with many beneficial thoughts and feelings………
Don’t even TRY and tell me you’ve read a better blurb. And - if you can believe it - the actual poetry leaves that blurb in the goddamn dust.
And speaking of brilliant books……
The Cameo
My guest this week is Caroline O’Donoghue.
What’s your job title/profession?
I’m a writer! I make all of my living from writing as a freelancer; I write novels, and for various websites. I edit a website called White Noise City two days a week, and I work for The Pool from home.
What would you love for people to know about your work?
Here comes the plug: My first novel - Promising Young Women - is coming out on June 7th, and I would love it if they bought it. In hardback! Not least because I have this vile, hideous fantasy of seeing people post pictures of their copies on Instagram with, like, freshly cut flowers and a half-drunk latte.
What might people be surprised to discover about your work?
How long I’ve been doing it! The language of debut novels - especially as a woman under 30 - is very ‘Oh, you’re an ingenue’, ‘you were plucked from nowhere.’ In fact, I’ve been doing the slog since I was 19, and I’ll be 28 in May. It felt like I was pushing a rock up a hill for a really long time, and it’s so nice to finally have people paying attention, but I think people often think you come out of nowhere, when in fact you’ve been trying for a really, really long time. Also, there are people who have been trying for years and years - I'm talking decades - who still get the "overnight success" narrative.
What made you/helped you to choose what you do?
It was the only thing I was good at, really! I was bookish enough as a kid, but not like prodigiously bookish, you know? My friend Ella talks about how she read Atonement when she was six or something – okay, I’m probably exaggerating - but I have so many women in my life who read voraciously at such young ages, and I was kind of reading Jacqueline Wilson until I was twelve, so I always feel so left out of that conversation! I was really bad at school, and creative writing was the only thing I did that got a positive reaction from people. So I must have thought ‘Aha, I’ll just keep doing the thing I get praised for!’ It was very empowering I think - being a bit useless at everything else, and then finding that one thing that people trust you with. And you just push that to the limit, don’t you?
What’s your perfect breakfast/lunch for a workday?
Black coffee, one sugar, and a toasted, buttered slice of banana bread.
(What do you actually have for breakfast/lunch?)
The banana bread dream breakfast occurs maybe once a week. Definitely as a Friday morning treat sort of thing. The rest of the time… toast and marmite is a standard.
What’s your alarm sound?
iPhone alarm: the sort of ascending bubbling sound.
Do you have a set morning routine?
Well, much like your breakfast question, there’s definitely a dream answer and an actual answer. Dream: I get up at 6, I start working, a little break at around 11, have a shower, take the dog out to Greenwich Park. Then I get back to work at about 2. At that point I don’t tend to come up with many ideas for things, so I’ll tend to d admin-y sort of stuff until 4. Then I clock off. I don’t generally work past 6pm – I just can’t. My brain only really works in the morning, and after that, it just becomes a case of diminishing returns.
That wake-up time, is that something that you had to build up to?
Yes indeed, especially when it’s winter and so dark. When I was writing my first novel, I gave up drinking for most of that year; I became very, very anti-social. I found I could just write much quicker in the morning. And because I still had a full-time job, I just wrote between 6 and 8am, and then I went to work, and then I would go to sleep at about 10 that night, and that’s just how it was for about six or seven months. And I actually didn’t mind it, you know! But I haven’t gone back to that level of discipline. I think I felt like I had so much to prove at the time.
Nowadays, I’ll pull on some exercise-y type clothes, sweatpants and a long jumper of some sort. I tend not to work in pyjamas, because then I find it hard to get going, but once I get into the whole showering, make-up type and all of that stuff, I’ll have interrupted the early morning flow. So that stuff tends to wait until 11. Similarly, I find that once you go on Twitter and stuff, you can get very in your own head and the words don’t flow as naturally.
Then obviously there are days where I don’t wake up until 8 and everything’s gone to shit. The day can still be salvaged, but it’s never quite as nice. Sometimes those ascending bubbling sounds just don’t do their job!
Do you have a dedicated/preferred space for writing? If so, what does it look like?
Different things for different tasks for me. When I commission and edit pieces for a website called White Noise, I’ll go into the office where the team is, and I really enjoy that; I can’t go too long without having someone to chat to. When I’m writing articles for The Pool, I’ll do it at my kitchen table. The seats are a little bit uncomfortable, which really appeals to me, because at The Pool we always work to very tight deadlines, and I always find I work better on deadline if I’m slightly uncomfortable, because I want to get out of the seat faster!
Then when I write fiction, I’ll generally take myself to a café, and sort of try to romance myself a bit more, you know what I mean? ‘Ohhhh you deserve things!’ It’s like taking yourself on a little date with your mind!
Preferred stationary/tools of the trade? Essential work items?
Beyond the trusty laptop, I like using un-lined paper. The ones that are supposed to be sketchbooks, I like using those a lot. I have quite large, untidy handwriting, and lined paper feels like a perpetual reminder that you’re failing! I really reset when I write on the reverse side of the page. I wish every page was fresh!
What are your work hours like? Do you try to create a routine for yourself or is that impossible given the nature of your work?
I used to have this image of the freelancer, perpetually on Twitter, covered in crumbs, never in bed – and that idea really scared me. I know some people who can do that and stay sharp. They don’t get up until 1pm, and they stay up until 4’o’clock in the morning, but that could never work for me. I knew I’d need some kind of structure. If something confounds my routine, things start to fall apart quite easily.
Do you work with fixed goals in mind or take it day by day depending on what comes up?
I definitely have fixed long term goals. At the moment, the only real goal is to finish my second book. And I know that in order to do that - and I have to get it done by the 1st of March - in my head!
(UPDATE: Caroline met this deadline! Katya obviously did not meet the deadline of transcribing this interview…)
I have to write 600 words per day, minimum. I find that really useful, because if I was just thinking "lalala, I’ll work on it until it’s done", I would just keep hammering on new bits and it would never get done!
With my first book, I got it into my head that a book is 100,000 words long. I don’t know why - I just decided that’s a nice round number. When I hit 50,000 words on my second book, I said to my friend Ella “Oh, I’m half way through!” And she said “….No you’re not! Books are 80,000 words long.” I was like “Wait, you mean I’m MORE than half-way done?” That was an excellent day.
What inspires you?
I think … Women? Just generally! ! Just talking to women. How women feel about each other fascinates me. Most of what I’ve done creatively started by chatting to another woman about something. It’s not even about taking the feminist political stance of “Oh I only want to talk about women because men are talked about ENOUGH, thank you very much!” I just find women incredibly compelling as storytellers, and as characters.
That’s the nature of The Pool as a website, so my articles tend to be about women, but my novels are also very much about women’s lives, and the music I create, for some reason, is always about women in history. The entire gender is my eternal muse!
What’s your favourite thing about your job?
Doing it! You hear a lot about writer’s block; writers who resent what they’re doing and say every word is tortuous… But I love thinking of every sentence as a puzzle. Especially when you’re writing something sort of funny and you need to work out which word feels funnier than the other? I love thinking about that.
Was that always the case? Have you ever experienced writer’s block?
I can’t remember a time in my life when I wasn’t writing, but there have definitely been times when I’ve had a crisis in confidence, and that communicates, I think, as a crisis of tone. When you start writing, you find a voice for yourself, and then I guess you fall in love with your own voice a bit? When I first started out, I really enjoyed being a little bit surrealist, a little bit weird. I felt like doing it again recently, so in my blog, Work in Prowess, I write things like fake tarot readings. I wrote about fake lunches between people, one of whom is dead.
You never really know what people are going to like. If you write something incredibly specific, that only two other people in the world will get, you get no response. Then you wonder, “does anyone really care?” That’s the level of insecurity that can go through your head; you start to worry that you sound like everybody else. I have that crisis of confidence sometimes: trying to keep what makes you unique, but you also want to be in the gang.
There are so many amazing women writers, who are around the same age as me, and they’re incredibly successful. In part that’s because they’re really good, and in part because they’re really good at appealing to a lot of people all at once. And that’s a HUGE talent. And sometimes I think “Ohhh I just want to be loved by everyone as much as SHE’S loved by everyone”, and other times I’m like “No! I’m indie and cool! I’m Karen O!”
Take someone like Dolly Alderton (and I’m sure she won’t mind me saying this): people love her because her outlook just resonates with so many women’s lives. I sometimes think “Oh my god, I would just love to have everything that she has,” but then you also have to do the thing where you stay in your own lane, and keep an eye on your own horse, and just think “we bring different things.”
You can’t make something that resonates with everybody, and you shouldn’t want it to! Because then - just like that - it’s inauthentic. You can always tell when someone’s trying to push that ‘Am I right ladies??!’
Least favourite?
If I was going to be blasé about it, I would say invoicing. But I guess the worst part of it really is the feeling of being misunderstood. When you’re a writer, your only job is to communicate what you think about a certain subject as clearly and as concisely as possible. And when a lot of people misunderstand you at once, it’s just a confirmation that today you failed at your job. And everybody fails at their job but when you’re a writer, it’s very public.
What do you do to get through days when you just don’t feel like it?
Oh sometimes you just can’t do it! I sometimes think that if I take a break from something, or don’t do something for a while that it’ll lose something. But that’s almost never the case! I mean, obviously never renege on a deadline, but beyond that.. if you can’t do something that day, just don’t fucking do it!
Or, if you have to do the thing, you can just change something about what you’re doing, either your location, or how you’re approaching it.
I think a lot of writers and freelancers avoid the phone, but I try to use it. I’ll call a commissioner –having found a desk phone number on their email signature (they’re always very surprised to be hearing from me!) and just say “Sorry, I’m just really stuck with this”, and generally that breathes new life into whatever I’m writing.
Do you have a go-to treat to get you out of a slump?
A Rolo yoghurt. God, they’re delicious.
Go-to work sustenance, meal, drink or snack-wise?
Definitely coffee to an extent. Anything in a can! Tuna, beans… any lunch thing that can be made in under nine minutes.
What’s your favourite part of the day?
When things have gone well, when I’ve gotten up at the right time, and done everything I needed to do, and then I take the dog out for an hour long walk, and I can just enjoy that I’ve had a really productive morning, and I can just exist in the world without having to worry that much. I mean, obviously I don’t get it every day, but then when I do get it, I really appreciate it.
Least favourite?
Going to sleep. I love sleep, but I increasingly find it harder to fall asleep these days. I find it really hard to switch my brain off, whereas my boyfriend falls asleep instantly – like mid-conversation – so then there’s that half hour period where I can’t switch on the light because he’s asleep, and I know that if I look at my phone then I won’t be able to fall asleep for longer… So that time can be quite lonely!
What’s been your favourite failure? One that you learnt a lot from, or one that you can look back and say ‘well I got through THAT, I’m unstoppable!’
This is definitely the one I think about the most: I used to write a lot of short stories. I would send them to the ten remaining publications in the world that does creative short stories, and almost unequivocally - apart from one submission to The Toast – people either didn’t reply, or refused them. Sometimes I would also enter competitions where you have to pay a fiver to enter, and if you want feedback you have to pay an extra two or three quid. Again they would always, always get rejected, and the feedback would be something completely copy and paste. It really took a dig at my confidence. And then one day there was this story which I ended up putting up on my website, Work in Prowess, because nobody had accepted it – even really tiny places – but I had this weird feeling that came across me, and it felt literally like someone turning on a light inside my stomach. I’d just suddenly thought “Oh! They’re wrong!” And it was the first time I’d ever felt like “No. This is good. I’m good.” For some reason, that feeling was even better than getting accepted. Then, about six months later, I had a meeting with the woman who is now my agent – Bryony Woods – and she said “I saw this story on your website, I loved it, and I want to represent you.”
Any top tips for the old work-life-balance quagmire?
Have an end point to your day. I guess there’s a thing for freelancers where you’re always tinkering, or always working, or whatever. I need to be able to say “I am closing my laptop. No more happens now.” Otherwise the work becomes very mediocre.
Do you have any hobbies/passions outside of your work?
Yoga is the least egregious form of exercise to me. I’m very into tarot. I love learning about it, I love reading people’s tarots, I think it’s great.
What’s one piece of advice you would give to someone who wants to do what you do?
I always think of Neil Gaiman, who says that there are three things you can be: you can be very talented, very reliable, or very nice to work with, and you have to have at least two. So I think everybody should work as hard as they can to do all three, and then probably settle on being two. I know so many writers who are incredibly talented, and incredible at putting sentences together, but will ever respond to an email properly, and you’ll never know when the work is coming in, and that can really scupper them.
What’s the best piece of advice someone’s ever given you? (Or worst!)
When I was a teenager, my English teacher (Miss Deirdre Cotter) set us some creative writing under the name ‘The Time Machine’. Just before she dismissed the class she said “by the way, I don’t want anybody to write about how surprised they are to find a time machine.” And I think about that all the time! I think about that in fiction, and in everything really – it’s really boring to read about how surprised someone is, or how angry they are, Like, that’s just fact: get to the bit where they go back in time!
So I guess in short, the advice is: get on with it!
What’s your top tip for getting shit done?
In terms of fiction, it’s nice to know that there are always several layers between you and your audience. There will be editors to catch you, so don’t worry about everything being perfect. I’m never more relaxed than when I’m on a plane, because then somebody else is responsible for my life.
What are you evangelical about recommending to people?
Quit! I’ve told people to quit their jobs so many times. And I’ve quit a lot of jobs. I think it’s one of those things that people are very, very scared of, and it begins a cycle where people are really sad, they want to apply for new jobs, they have no energy to do that. Just quit, man. Just walk away.
Which three songs should I listen to this week?
Harry Harris: Sensorama
The Cranberries: Ode to My Family
HAIM: Want You Back
Promising Young Women comes out on June 7th!!!! Pre-order/post-order your copy today, depending on when you read this.
Check out her podcast: School for Dumb Women. It’s a total joy and I’m happy enough to self-identify as their intended audience, because I always learn a LOT.
Caroline’s blog - Work in Prowess - is such a brilliant pocket of the internet. It’s definitely the pocket where you find a long-forgotten tenner. See for yourself:
I know I’ve shared this post here before, but I see absolutely nothing wrong with going for it again: Some Thoughts on Sophie and Vlad, the Secondary and Most Important Relationship in 1992’s Anastasia.
Learning to Read Tarot with Jerry Seinfeld is also a real treat.
Oh, and The Brief, Perfect Meeting of Nigella Lawson and Angela Carter.
Last but not least! Caroline’s band, Greyhounds Greyhound Greyhounds, has a new EP! It’s called The Attagirls, and you can listen to it here.
Find Caroline on Twitter: @czaroline.
My kingdom to Caroline for being my first ever phone interview, and for being a complete and utter delight.
Needless to say, the app that I bought to record our conversation didn’t work even a little bit (Yes, I’m looking at you, TapeACall Pro) but - being the high-flying tech-wiz that I am - I also had the call on speakerphone, and recorded it using PhotoBooth on my laptop. I opened the program for the first time since, oh I don’t know, 2010? Like, there’s a picture of me in front of a blotchy, pixellated Eiffel Tower, there’s me under the sea apparently, there’s the obligatory light tunnel/pop art/fish eye series, and then there’s this interview with a fantastic novelist. Cool, cool.
It’s a 90 minute video, just of my living room, with occasional flashes of my own reflection when I peer in to make sure it’s still working, and immediately recoil in horror when I remember what I look like. Definitely one for the archives.
Some Music
My dear friend Bobby Britt has released an album! It’s called Alaya, and if you like music that feels like an arrow-straight line from one person’s heart to yours, then FILL YOUR BOOTS.
I think the reason I adore this album is two-fold:
1. Bobby is just SUCH a good fiddle player, so - okay - there's that.
2. We used to live together in Boston, so this album reminds me of when I got to hear him play EVERY DAY. And my god it was the best.
And! Katch-Up guest, and (I SUPPOSE more importantly) phenomenal musician Bellatrix has just released a fantastic new single!
It’s called Wish I Could, and I wish I could find it easily on Spotif - OH WAIT.
Links!
My appreciation for Harry Connick Jr has gone into the STRATOSPHERE since discovering this video. It’s true what they say: friends don’t let friends clap on 1 & 3.
Inside My Makeup Bag: Drag Queen Edition by the absolute icon that is Crystal Rasmussen, OBE.After this I prime — I prefer MAC Strobe Cream because I want to blind my enemies. I spend a while thinking about how Ayn Rand has a lot to answer for, before taking MAC Full Coverage in NW24 and smearing it generously all over my gender non-binary face to conceal the fact that I’m actually Holly Valance. Top time- and energy-saving tip: Get a makeup artist.
This is the man I’m marrying, pretending to be Dame Judi Dench. And that’s way up there with sentences I never thought I’d write.
I am absolutely fascinated by this story about a symphony orchestra that moved into a school, and transformed the neighbourhood.My kitchen table has achieved a level of celebrity the likes of which I will never know! By which I mean my friend Kate came over and made the most delicious Eggs Benedict of my life, then wrote up the recipe for the Guardian.
Some Good Slow Burns For When You Need Them.
My brother taught me this one: “He/she has a very powerful energy.” Is it a compliment? Is it a devastating insult? It’s a slow burn, is what it is.
55 Incredible Photos Of Girls Going To School Around The World. I find these photos impossibly moving, and extraordinarily heartening.
This inspiring story was exactly what I needed to read yesterday, during an afternoon lull.
This is so silly, but it properly makes me laugh every time I watch it:
At last! This website converts your pasted text into UPPER CASE, lower case, Sentence case, Title Case, and Capitalised Case! (Okay, those last two came out the same, but the two word example just didn’t give them time in the sun. That’s on me.)Honest Unsubscribe Options
I realise this is uncomfortably relevant here.
And that’s it! See you soon!
Love,
Katya
The Katch-Up's header illustration is by the brilliant Tamsin Baker.
You can find previous letters here.