Readings Monthly editor Elke Power asks award-winning novelist Hannah Kent for a glimpse into her forthcoming book, a memoir and love letter to Iceland, the country that inspired Burial Rites, the debut novel that started a publishing bidding war and launched Kent into international literary stardom.
Elke: Your exquisite memoir will be published at the end of April. To give our readers a preview, could you briefly summarise it?
Hannah: Always Home, Always Homesick is my love letter to Iceland, and my reckoning with what it means to forever be held between places and people. It’s the story of how a year spent living in a small Icelandic fishing village turned me into a writer, alongside a wider reflection on the country’s relationship to literature, legends and ghosts. And it’s the story of one ghost in particular, and the haunting that led me to write my first book, Burial Rites.
Elke: The story of why you ended up in Iceland and how you came to develop your deep connection to the land and people of a country unconnected to your original heritage is one of the many unfolding joys of your book. Can you imagine how your life might have been different if you hadn’t gone to Iceland, or developed the ability to think and speak in Icelandic?
Hannah: I can and I can’t! The older I become, the greater my understanding of the myriad ways my connection to Iceland has shaped my creative self. I have been deeply influenced by its literature, myths and sagas, yes, but learning Icelandic at such a formative age completely dismantled my understanding of language. I realised that words hold culture and history, and that, when you acquire another language, you, in many ways, acquire another self. This was a revelation to me at seventeen. It made me very aware of the power of words and of storytelling, and this cognisance has informed my practice in a multitude of ways.
I think I would have always come to writing one way or another – it has been a constant in my life since I was very young – but Iceland wrested a creative hunger and curiosity out of me with a force and exuberance that I feel to this day.
Elke: Many readers are curious about the writers and writerly methods behind the books they love. Your reflections on becoming a writer and how your writing practice has changed since childhood, including since becoming a parent, reveal a deep sense of vocation. Is it possible to define what is important to you about writing, or being a writer? Or perhaps what has been the biggest surprise in your writing life so far?
Hannah: There have been many times now when, for one reason or another, I have feared writing would leave me. Life changes, personal upheavals, less time, more responsibilities, world events disrupted my discipline, and I’ve thought, that’s it. But writing always came back, or rather, I came back to it – often in new and unexpected ways. My capabilities or interests have often shifted in the process, and they inevitably made me a better writer. A more flexible, resilient writer. This has been surprising. Now I understand that life necessitates a frequent recalibration of practice and expectation, and I surrender to that.
Elke: Always Home, Always Homesick is your first nonfiction book. How have you found the experience of writing and publishing a memoir instead of a novel?
Hannah: I spend so much time researching my novels – often one to two years – that I very stupidly assumed a memoir would be a walk in the park. I knew all the material already! In truth, I found it challenging. It took me some time to understand where the boundaries of my memoir would lie, both in the sense of what I was willing to tell, and what was best kept private, and in the sense of its narrative shape.
Elke: The role of a fiction writer when exploring the lives of real people, or addressing historical injustices or misrepresentations, is a key issue you consider. In times of change or trouble, does fiction have a role to play?
Hannah: Undoubtedly. I have learned more about the lives of real people, historical injustices and past and present misrepresentations from fiction than almost anywhere else. A reader who reads fiction is continually reminded of the inmost, subjective world of others. Understanding expands beyond the narrow parameters of personal experience. Fiction is deeply humanising.
Elke: You offer bracing comparisons between the support for local literary culture in Iceland and Australia. Is there anything you’d like to share here about the disparity between the two approaches and their implications? Is there anything you’d suggest readers do to advocate for writers and stories in Australia?
Hannah: There are many, many people who advocate for writers and stories here in Australia, and I am very grateful for the work they do. Any reader who supports their local independent bookshop and who actively seeks out Australian literature is an advocate. Thank you to everyone who does this!
One of the biggest discrepancies between literature in Australia and Iceland is the allocation of funding. In Iceland, literature receives the most support out of any arts practice. Here, it receives the least, which can be deeply discouraging. We have such a vibrant and exciting literary culture in Australia, but how many more voices might reach the world if our writers, editors, booksellers and publishers were better supported?
Elke: You write about a moment some years after the publication of Burial Rites in which you feel the full intensity of the realisation that you cannot bring your writing with you into the present – that even works of historical fiction are as much a product of the time in which they are created as of the time they depict. I think this must be something that has always weighed on the minds of writers – do you think it is something that has become even more challenging for modern writers, with the internet and rapid pace of change? How hard is it to make peace with this reality of writing life?
Hannah: I think it is perhaps a greater issue for contemporary writers than it has been historically, only because of the rapid pace of change, as you say. I don’t know if every writer is anxious about the possibility of time dating their work or coming cultural shifts revealing an ugliness or narrow-mindedness, or a lack of understanding. I hope to do my best with the knowledge my current time affords me and, if it becomes necessary, to have the humility to recognise my work’s flaws and limitations, and to acknowledge harm unforeseen at the time but nonetheless caused. That is how you make peace with it, I think.
Elke: What do you hope readers will take away with them after they read Always Home, Always Homesick?
Hannah: I hope readers find it beautiful, moving and a little bit funny. But most of all, I hope Always Home, Always Homesick reminds readers of their own lives, and the ways in which story has made – and continues to make – them remarkable and precious.
Elke: In these unsettling times, are there any books you have been drawn to read (or re-read!) as a way of making sense of – or to briefly gain respite from – the news? (Side note: I would recommend your memoir to our readers as an inspiring escape from the relentless news cycle.)
Hannah: I oscillate between reading as a means of greater awareness and understanding of world events and reading as a respite from them. Both are important, although the latter is a privilege not available to all.
Books which have recently helped me learn, engage, recharge and escape include The Sunbird by Sara Haddad, Songs for the Dead and the Living by Sara M. Saleh, Gathering Moss by Robin Wall Kimmerer and Gideon the Ninth by Tamsyn Muir.
About Hannah Kent
Hannah Kent’s first novel, the multi-award-winning international bestseller, Burial Rites, was translated into over 30 languages and is being adapted for film. Her novels The Good People and Devotion have been translated into multiple languages, shortlisted for numerous awards and are being adapted for film. Her original feature film, Run Rabbit Run, was directed by Daina Reid and starred Sarah Snook. Kent is also the co-founder of Kill Your Darlings, and has been widely published in print. She lives and works on Peramangk and Kaurna Country. Always Home, Always Homesick is available on 29 April – you can preorder it here.
