Writing Out Loud--Shelby Foote

[Music] writing out loud a program designed to explore in-depth interviews with writers to hear that words have voices our Hostess for today's program is Teresa Miller executive director for the Oklahoma center for poets and writers at OSU Tulsa hello everyone I'm Teresa Miller and welcome to writing out loud my very special guest today is the acclaimed novelist and writer Shelby fot thank you for being here I'm glad to be here I said writer in addition to being a novelist because you're also known for your historical narratives and you've said that the novelist and the historian are after the same truth and I just wonder how your work as a novelist on some of these great books like Shiloh and uh loving a dry season how that prepared you for writing your three volume work on the Civil War it's a great shame that more historians don't uh try their hand out of Novel they would learn an awful lot about handling plot which they don't seem aware of also they would recognize the need for distinctive clear forceful writing which they also think is a waste of time what you want to do is get the facts together but the truth about is is the the facts will never give you what happened you can stack them up and they'll be completely accurate but they won't tell you what's going on and uh I think that in fact I'll be talking about it tonight or tomorrow I think that a historian and a novelist are doing exactly the same thing except one of them gets his facts out of documents and the other one gets his facts out of his head but they both have a and almost respect for the facts but the novelist knows how to handle them to put the juice in there not falsely but but the real thing and the historian thinks you're wasting your time if you try to write well you better spend your time looking up facts rather than writing what about the Civil War compelled you so much to go into the depth you did in your writing because you spent 20 years that three volume 20 years is nothing compared to what really ought to be done with the war it it truly defined us it made us what we are we'd be a very different very different country today if it had not been for the Civil War deciding which way we were going the South had one notion the North had another and the north prevailed and we became that kind of country and nobody really regrets it in the sense of they thinking we took a wrong turn MH but they are interesting aspects of the Southern point of view I think emancipation would have been carried out much better in a gradual way uh as the Confederates I hope we intended to do then they're suddenly announcing to 5 million people you are free hit the road there have been a lot of trouble as a result of that uh many of the criticisms of the South most especially with regard to SL slavy are just and right and many Southerners knew that they were but there was scarcely anything they could do about it if you had 1,000 acres of land and say 150 slaves um the slaves were worth more than the land so for the government to come along and say the slaves are free meant bankruptcy for you and it was done over and over again and maybe those people might great-grandfathers for instance deserved whatever happened to him but it didn't seem to me the best solution to the problem by a long shot you know one of the things that interested to me about your historically historical Narrative Approach to the Civil War series was that you did have that blend that way of bringing history to life could you have told personally have told that story any other way uh I don't know I could have used a whole set of things I had to leave out as much as I put put in so I could rewrite the whole thing God forbid using a whole another set of set of facts and a whole different emphasis so it it just happened that all all my life came together I found the subject I was born I guess to deal with and I felt very comfortable people are always praising me for having spent 20 years working at one thing believe me I enjoyed every minute of it it wasn't any hard hardship on me it was a it I felt Freer while I was writing Civil War than any other time in my life I I was also going to make this this comparison and I going to see if you thought it seems to me your historical Narrative Approach is very similar to what Ken Burns does in his film manic they they are similarities of course Ken had it to go by he used it Absolut sort of sort of guide and uh I liked very much what he did he did another thing that people don't pay much attention to that's extremely important uh most Civil War historians especially the greatly admired ones think the whole thing was fought in the east in Virginia while while there was skirmishing going on in Mississippi and out here in Texas now uh they are wrong the Civil War was fun won and lost in the west the most important battle of the Civil War maybe and they didn't any such thing as the most important but if I would put thumb screws on me and made me name one I'd probably name Fort Donaldson very early in the war they Mark the emergence of Grant many other people were there and when they lost it they lost Kentucky most of Tennessee and it set the pattern for fighting in the west uh where the gaining control of the Mississippi River split the south in two and then Sherman of course after the Atlanta Campaign set out for the coast so it's in the west that you ought to look for the winning and loser into the war not in the East where what what they did Under The Genius of Robert E Lee they skirmished up and down that 100 miles of ground between Washington and Richmond but uh the real war was fought out here in the west riding uh pretty much a solitary life what was it like for you to be able to be a part of the Ken burn um film the Civil War that was all after I'd finished the war and besides I was doubtful about having anything to do with it you know that's what I was wondering if you were a little bit reluctant to get involved I wasn't a television fan and I wasn't too sure that writers ought to be flashing themselves on the little screen and all that they to be home right and but I I agreed to do it and once I was into it I saw what a good job he was going to do so I was glad to be part of him and then you certainly became very recognized iable I mean we all recognized your name but after appearing that people suddenly recognize you on the street and it brought a whole new level of celebrity for you that's right uh but the other thing that really got me was uh Ken limited himself except for the pictures of present day in color he limited to material right out of the war itself the old photographs and the rest of it and I saw that he really was out to discover what this war meant to this nation instead of some kind of agiz of himself making a a m setting thing and I was glad to be part of it burns Scholars critics have all commended You for Your Balanced view in the book this the series of Civil War was that hard for you to maintain that balance as a native Southerner it wasn't at all um my fiction is full of villains and heroes and uh I think Bill Sykes is as important as David Copperfield so you you villains are very much a part of your story and uh you identify them as villains then you get interested in them and they're very real people sometime realer than the heroes so I had no trouble at all trying to deal sympathetically with northern generals like Grant and Sherman it seems one to me one of the nicest pieces of Praise that came to get M have mean a great deal to you is when your friend Walker Percy uh describe the book as the American Iliad right that was that's quite a blurb how is it you don't get blurbs any better than that and I just wondered if when you started the Civil War and that had to be an overwhelming thing you know you sit down at the typewriter and type out the Civil War knowing where to where to begin did you understand then the scope this work not at all what happened was I had written five novels down in Mississippi where I live and I moved to Memphis in 10 to make a change of pace before I started on another set of fire and I got a letter from Bennett surf who owned and and ran random house ask him if I'd be willing to write a short history of the Civil War he was going to start something like a landmark series V him on the Civil War V him on the first world war Spanish American war various things and I thought that'd be a good way to I was going to take a year off anyhow so I thought that'd be a good way to spend year just writing this little short thing on Civil War and I sat down and outlined it and I hadn't more than finished and outlined it where I saw I wasn't going to be happy writing a little summary of who War so I wrote back and told him I'd be willing to do the whole thing prad eagle and so he gave him an outline of the three volumes and it was Silence from about 10 days and then then he wrote and said go ahead and I did for 20 years when you work on a project that long is it hard to let it go yes um when Gibbon finished the declining fall if I could be excused calling him up uh he he he described how he wrote The Last Word and he was sitting outoors in Switzerland overlooking Lake lern he said his first reaction was a huge s of relief he finished his hard long job then a great sadness came over him like he was losing an old friend I had that same same reaction when I finished it Elation and then s yeah I can imagine that would be be so mentioned your good friendship with Walker Percy how import important was that friendship to you as a writer as a human relationship uh even including my own family I didn't have anything more important to me than my Walker friendship and your letters have been collected in the correspondence of Shelby foot and Walker Percy and this is a Wonder wonderful wonderful read I well we never thought that anybody would ever see those things except each other well what is very interesting too even though he he he gave you lavish Praise by you know saying the Civil War series was the you know American Iliad at the same time he didn't always you know think everything you did was wonderful he I think follow me down he didn't like that novel as much he thought it was a dirty book he had very strong feelings against follow me down is it important in the literary friendship that you have to be willing to accept that kind of response in addition to the praise exactly it can make you angry there's nothing wrong with being angry at a friend it happens all the time and uh we knew what would make each other angry and we would only say those things on purpose never accidentally make them angry you've said that the modern writer who has influenced you the most was William Farner and yet you've also said that you don't think his work will have the lasting impact of Hemingways why is that I I didn't mean impact I meant influence I think that Hemingway is probably the most influential writer who ever wrote and by that I mean there's nobody writing a sports story today who's not influenced by Hemingway style there nobody writing anything for newspapers and magazines that the Heming way uh Outlook doesn't come into it some of it's pretty shabby as a matter of fact Hemingway has his real bad side along with his great side I don't think Hemingway is anything like his great a writer as William fauler but I think he's a more influential writer than William fauler what was the greatness of faul her's work he he he said that what he was writing about and all good writers are writing about is the human heart in conflict with itself and that's what he was writing about his whole life long and he wrote about it wonderfully well also wanted to ask you about some other Mississippi Riders first off udor Welty did you know youor Welty we were good friends and uh udor and I used to drink bourbon together and this that and the other she was always a great pleasure to be around and as I said earlier I don't think anybody ever spent 5 minutes with her who didn't fairly worship the ground she walked on what about her literary output it it's it's it's a very real thing you measures up to any other Mississippi writer including William fogner in her particular way she's a real good writer what about Richard Wright also from Mississippi Richard Wright had so many personal problems that it influenced in not a good way along with a good way but Richard Wright had was torn in so many different directions that it interfered with his work uh he he was obliged to take shelter in the Communist part for instance not not from ideological reasons but for sort of racial reasons everybody else had treated him in such a Shabby way the Communist welcome him with an open arm but one of the things I one one thing that has been said by critics is that the some of the importance of his work was diminished because he was African-American do you agree with that at all no I think the opposite is true I think his contribution is particularly the africanamerican and gets a dignity and a strength from that exact opposite why have so many great great American novelists come from from the south I think this is a long tradition of Storytelling I remember youor and I were talking one time with leis Ruben and uh we tried to answer that question and both of us decided that the characteristic thing of a southerner in telling a joke always tells a story a northerner tells a pat Mike joke two people in but southerness is always a story and I think this storytelling is it very hard of what makes a novelist I was going to ask you what you thought did about the the Eastern critics and and their understanding of Southern literature flaner o Conor complained about that from time to time that they didn't fully understand do you think that's changing and there's greater understanding of the Southern themes I don't think it requires as much understanding southern rers no long seem to me be all that southern they just whole bunch of hippies as far as I'm concerned looking back at that golden age of Southern writers who were some of the ones that stood out for you some people of that are pretty well forgotten now uh you don't have to go south to find them a writer whose work I respect enormously is John O'Hara from Pennsylvania he's almost forgotten now his books are all out of print they were hugely popular in that time and know her is an important riter he's he's does what say backer is or better probably trop is to the English novel and yet he's faded out I think he'll come back Hemingway's faded too people don't really read himing way anymore they know his name but they don't read his book I think they've dropped off on reading fauler but fauler has a great advantage of appealing enormously the intellectuals college professors and the rest of them they keep him a line analyzing line after line trying to figure out what do you think about all this critical analysis that goes on I don't think it does any harm and it entertains a lot of people it entertains them I think that's quite quite good Kim Burns has also said said about your work that you are a great great novelist who has devoted the largest portion of your life to writing one of the great works of nonfiction so we've got to talk about about your novels do you have a favorite of of your novels a personal favorite that's a question no writer can ever answer or at least he'll give you one answer on Monday and another one on Thursday I suspected that yeah but you have a great selection we're going to be showing some of them on on screen certainly um your your novel Shiloh has been described as one of your most popular novels why do you it is the most popular of them uh the trouble with the wrer judge in his own work is he looks at it they are printed and he sees what he meant to put in it whether it's there or not not he doesn't know he thinks it's there so he's not a very good judge of his own work the other thing is uh he's L with the judge a book by how much he enjoyed writing I wrote an novel called love and a dry season that I enjoyed myself from start to finish so it have to be my favorite book when I think about where I was when was I happiest and so on I was going to ask you too were there any special challenges for you as a writer one of the things that's always been hardest for me is a transition how to how to get from the the the narrative transitions did you have any special challenges to you as a writer no I enjoyed those challenges they were challenges but I enjoyed them I learned a great deal from Henry James about shifting point of view and putting climaxes in books and places where they'd be effective uh and those are technical problems and therefore usually fun to solve do you ever go back and reread your novel I do I even listen to them on taper by someone else what's your reaction to audio book I enjoy it it's good to go to sleep by do you get new are you ever surprised by lines that you've written and things did I really write that no no you remember every word I guess so if I'm reminded yeah do you actually remember where you were when you wrote certain passages that stand out sometimes sometimes when it me well that's very easy I do all my writing at my desk if I go stay at a hotel somewhere I don't wake up in the middle of the night and write something you use a computer no my God no you're still using a typewriter I don't even use a typewriter use a dip pen oh a dip pin not even a fountain pin it makes me take my time 3 or 400 words is 5 600 is a good day for me good long hard days work do you think we're producing some novels too quickly these days with the emphasis on commercialism and publish some writers write fast others right slow it doesn't have anything to do with how good or bad they are everybody's got his own way to talk about riters is like talking about chairs there so many different kinds of writing not only are you a very prolific writer a lot has been written about you the University of Mississippi Press has published a collection of interviews with you conversations with Shelby fit and I want to talk about this new biography of you Stuart Chapman's Shelby foot a writer's life what do you think about uh biography of you I think we would be do better not to write about it it's so inaccurate that it angers me does it you tell me not his opinion of my work the biographical facts are so wrong well you told me a very interesting story about your Bulldog yeah I had a bull Teran named Rattler he was a he he he was too brave if he had a difference another dog he'd have to kill the other dog and he got him mixed up with a Hound we had called Harry who was a very cowardly dog with a low threshold of pain and he thinks that Harry was Rattler and and it's not a very serious mistake but it's a complete mistake well you know criticize me but not my dog kind of philosophy I mean that we went the record straight I'm glad we got to to go that's absolutely true is it sort of overwhelming is it surprising to you sometimes that all this has been written about you that people are studying you like it it it surprises me some I don't mind it at all I I don't uh Mr Fulon had an utter privacy thing he was strong on that they wanted to put him on the cover of both time and Newsweek and he wouldn't see him wouldn't talk with him he uh he he he he just didn't believe in writers having anything to do with critics or journalist what sort of things do you like to read I like to read the classic things I probably enjoy reading Shakespeare more than anything in the world I like to read uh his history Roman history tus is my favorite historian uh I like to read the classic standard things it took it took me a long time to get around to reading several books that I had trouble finding sometime uh Richardson for instance I had a hard time finding it's the longest novel in the English language forgot the name of it even it's a wonderful book but I looked at secondhand bookstores all over New York until I finally found it it it's it's very strange what can be good to you after you mature when I finished the War I took a year off to read books that I enjoyed so much before I started the war and I was a completely different person reading reading that so that it uh it was illuminated to me to reread things that I had read as an adolescent and see how much I had missed it's an interesting thing everybody should do that go back and reread the books that impressed him most when he was like 15 16 I I agree with you we were talking off camera about Carson of colors and I went back recently and Rew member of the wedding and I thought this is one of the most extraordinary books it I've ever read that's right you met so many of the Great authors and and know so many of the great author authors and in artists were there ever any writers that you wanted to meet that you didn't get to uh yeah any any number of them uh I was sorry I never met John O'Hara uh most people who knew O'Hara said you're very fortunate not to have met him might have been dis I still would like to like to have met him yeah uh do you have any advice since since since obviously you've looked other writers as mentors at least through through their work for for people who are Wonder W to write now if you want to write there two things you have to do one is read read read and above all reread when you reread a good writer you know where he's going so you can watch him get there you don't know where he's going the first time you read it so you're so busy seeing where he's going but when you know where he's going and you can see him build up this thing for his good now so that teaches you a great deal the other thing is keep writing uh try to describe not for any reason just somebody walking across the room and if you can get it right then you're ready to start being a right as we look over your career you've had so many successes were there every ever points in your career when you think gosh I just thought I just can't go on with this did that you got discouraged or did you just never allow yourself to feel that way I never had that problem I I've had sad days and happy days but I never felt that my writing uh was was was any doubt about this what I should do what are you working on now I I'm working on fiddling around with things I did a a three volume collection of check off stories for mod Library doing a two volume on Opa S I did a in depth study of Steven Crane's Red Badge of Courage things like that uh they suit me now I don't want to start a novel or write a history anymore I've had my discharge when we've just got a few minutes left here but when you go back and you look at Steven Crane's Red Badge of Courage what message do you want to get across to readers of that book well that particular book he keeps having optimistic views that everything's going to be fine it always turns out terrible and the end of the book is everything's really going to be wonderful and you know it's not ye isburg is just up the road the battle fault in the red badg is obviously Chancellor's Ville and Gettysburg is going to follow soon and you know that all his Rosy hopes are fixing to disappear in the boom and bang of Gettysburg so it's um it's interesting to see from that point of view Mr foot has been a great honor to get to visit with you today thank you for taking time out to share with us congratulations on this wonderful Trilogy and your collection of novels and I'll be curious to visit with you again and see which novel is now your favorite take care Mr foot and thank all of you for joining us on writing out loud [Music] [Music] [Applause] [Music] a [Music] [Music] oh [Music]

Channel: Writing Out Loud

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Id: B75PpIiuRBQ

Length: 27min 52sec (1672 seconds)

Published: Wed Apr 24 2024