To Shay Youngblood page on the AALBC web site
BEFORE THE LIVE BN CHAT, SHAY YOUNGBLOOD AGREED TO ANSWER SOME OF OUR QUESTIONS:
barnesandnoble.com: In SOUL KISS, Mariah contemplates her nomadic mother's whereabouts and romanticizes the idea of traveling in her own mind. If you could travel anywhere in the world, what would be your most romantic destination?
Shay Youngblood: On my first book tour, for THE BIG MAMA STORIES, I got into a car with a friend, and we drove across the entire United States and parts of Canada doing readings at bookstores and schools. I was in awe of the splendor and beauty in this country. As a Peace Corps volunteer, I lived in the Caribbean, and I've lived in France and Hawaii as well. I used to think that Paris was the most romantic place in the world, because it's so easy to fall in love with the people, the food, the atmosphere. Everything is so sensual, the air itself is intoxicating. I fell in love several times the year I lived in Paris. So while I still believe that Hawaii is an earthly paradise and the Caribbean, God's front yard, I think that the most romantic place in the world is wherever you are with the person you love.
BN: What books have influenced you most in your lifetime?
SY: I have been influenced by everything I've read, from "Little Red Riding Hood" (I suddenly became aware of my great-grandmother's mortality) and "Cinderella" (I became aware of class differences and came to realize that living well was the best revenge) to the books I read randomly for the sake of discovering something new. Back then (as a child), I thought it was possible to read everything. To this day, I'm usually reading two or more books at a time, trying to catch up.
As a child I was interested in science, philosophy, cooking, gardening, travel. I especially liked sneaking into the adult section to read forbidden books. The place where I grew up was very insulated; however, when I read, I was transported into a much larger world. I was transformed. As an only child, I played with books as if they were other children. I still have a sense of adventure when it comes to books. My first question to someone I've just met is often, "What have you read lately that just knocked you out?" Whether it's a tightly plotted mystery, a beautifully written literary novel, a self-help book, or a stunningly illustrated children's book, I'm open to new reading experiences. I read poetry, new authors, classics, foreign authors, and lots of nonfiction plays and essays. My biggest contemporary influences have been Ann Petry, Alice Walker, Toni Morrison, Toni Cade Bambara, James Baldwin, Ralph Ellison, and Richard Wright. These were the first black writers I read. Reading them made it seem possible that I could tell stories too.
When a young friend of mine was diagnosed with leukemia, I wished for a book that could heal her. I realized that although a book could not heal her, the power of language could ease her pain and help her laugh, hope, or even imagine a cure for her disease.
BN: What, to you, is the most important day of the year?
SY: The most important day of the year for me is always the current one. I try to stay in the present. My motto is, Life is short, live today as if it is all you have. It works for me.
Online chat dated Wednesday, May 28, 1997
Moderator: Hello, and welcome to barnesandnoble.com's Live Events Auditorium! Tonight we are pleased to welcome Shay Youngblood, author of the beautiful novel SOUL KISS. We are glad you could join us -- welcome!
Josie from White Plains, NY: I read your interview in the First Fiction page of this site and noticed that in writing, you seem to come up with an idea and then develop a plot and characters around it. Is that true? Do you usually start with characters or an idea that you'd like to explore?
Shay Youngblood: I start with both, actually, and an idea
that I'd like to develop and a character that I'd like to invent comes through in the
idea. In the case of SOUL KISS, I wanted to explore a forbidden subject. The idea that
parents and children are a little bit in love with each other, and how that would affect a
character's development.
Amanda@aol.com from Louisville, KY: Shay, have you ever taken a cross-country trip like the ones that Mariah embarks upon, first with her mother and then later to see her father? You have such a grasp of road travel. Loved the book, made me cry....
SY: I'm glad you loved the book, and yes, I have taken two
cross-country trips, one on a bus, and another when my first book came out. I got in a car
with a friend and toured the U.S. And so I had those memories to draw on.
Catherine from San Simeon: Shay, I enjoyed your book. One thing troubled me, though. How come no one ever taught Mariah about her sexuality? With so many guardians, no one ever seemed to sit her down. She was such a sensual person from the outset, you would think one of her aunts would have tried a little harder to reel her in, or teach her about the dangers from men like Jesus Miguel Monteverde.
SY: The aunts were much older; they were not used to
having young people around, and were very uncomfortable talking about her sexuality with
her. They did the best they could under the circumstances, providing food, shelter, and
sometimes vague lessons for living. They had never been parents before, so they were sort
of casting in the dark, doing the best that they could. They are from another generation
as well, and it was not OK to talk about private things like sex and sexuality.
Jim T. from Hillsboro, NJ: Did you find it hard writing a novel as opposed to writing a play? What was the main difference?
SY: Well, in theater, you have collaborators to provide a
visual and aural context for the story. You have set designers, lighting designers,
musicians, a director who interprets the work usually in absence of the author. They
provide the details. I focus on creating characters, through their language, dialogue, and
dramatic action on the page. In the novel, the author has to describe in vivid language,
using only words to show what the world the characters live in looks like, what it smells
like, what it sounds like. For me, that was the most difficult transition, learning how to
create details so that the reader could imaging the world I was trying to create.
Fortunata from a clean, well-lighted place: Shay, what do you feel are the positive and negative effects on a child who grows up in an eroticized environment, as you put it? I love your writing.
SY: Thank you. I think the positive effect, particularly
in the case of SOUL KISS, is that Mariah is open to many possibilities; she is very
affectionate, she is very comfortable with her body, she is very curious. Unfortunately,
sometimes she is unclear about her boundaries, and with the absence of a parent to help
her sort through a lot of her feelings, it is difficult for her to have healthy
relationships. She has to work harder to sort those things out, to sort out who she is and
who she wants to become, as a sexual person.
Marco from 75th: Do you write poetry? It seems that your style is too fluid and dripping with sensuality to be confined to mere prose and playwriting. Who do you read for inspiration in poetry? Any favorite lines?
SY: I am very much inspired by poetry. Many of my friends
are poets, and I of course read their work. Also, one of the first questions I ask people
when I meet them for the first time is, "What have you read recently that just
knocked you out?" And I keep a list of those titles and take bookstore breaks and
pick books at random to read passages from in the poetry section.
Kielty from abroad: Hi, this book was sent to me and I love it. I'm traveling in Spain right now and doing a lot of journal work. Where do you write, and what do you write, for just you? Do you have words in places, like Mariah does deep in her pockets and in her mouth and mind, that no one else can see and read but you?
SY: I write all the time; I'm always writing in my head, I
always carry a piece of paper and a pen with me wherever I go. I have to be careful not to
step in front of cars when I take walks, because an image, a line, a word, will come to me
and I will be taken away by it, and I have to write. I write everything longhand, and I
write whatever comes to my mind. I revise a lot, and so I collect images and words and
pour them onto the page. And yes, I do have secret words I keep just for myself. I also
keep a journal, especially when I'm traveling. I'm very glad that you enjoyed the book.
Dennis Marlidge from Syosset: Shay, hello. What is your stance on the current debate surrounding adoption by same-sex couples? The reason I ask is because Mariah's two aunts virtually are married, they have "grown into one another," to quote you, and are depicted as Mariah's greatest guardians.
SY: A loving home is a healthy home, no matter what sex
the parents are, or the parent is. In a loving environment, a child can grow and thrive.
Marcus from Rockledge: Hello, Shay. It is a pleasure to be able to "talk" to you like this. My question: In SOUL KISS, you present color in the most vivid ways imaginable, and really use its vibrancy as a tool that few others lately have done. How did you harness color so effectively? If that is too ambiguous -- how does one convey visual perception in prose?
SY: There's a lot of music in SOUL KISS; it's structured
in a way like blues or jazz. In music I see color, and in Mariah's world.... I wanted to
create a world that was very vivid, very colorful. The characters themselves dicated to me
how their world was painted, and in that case I was a translator.
Lindsey from Philadelphia: Will you ever turn SOUL KISS into a play?
SY: No. SOUL KISS was born a novel, and that's what it is.
Harold S. from Hot Springs: Shay, can you tell us more about your playwriting experiences? Have you ever directed? Acted? Done tech?
SY: I have done everything. In graduate school at Brown
University, Paula Vogel ("Baltimore Waltz" and "How I Learned to
Drive") insisted that in order to be a good playwright, it is valuable to produce,
direct, act, as well as write, and so I've done them all. I've written five plays -- two
were published -- and I've adapted a children's picture book for the stage: AMAZING GRACE
by the English author Mary Hoffman, for the children's theater in Minneapolis. And I
continue to write plays, and other things as well.
Kimmi from Oakland, CA: Hi, Shay! The names in SOUL KISS seem to have much sensual meaning -- Matisse (visual), Coral (color), Rosemary (smell and taste). How intentional was that? Does Mariah have any sort of meaning?
SY: The names of the characters often come to me when I'm
in a half-asleep, half-dreaming state, and the names often come from my subconscious. I
also collect interesting and unusual names, and it is like naming a child -- I try to fit
the name to the personality of the character -- and I actually liked the sound of Mariah
when I sang it. "Mariah." I sang it. It fit.
Wanderer from wherever I am: Do you like to travel? If yes, what do you bring along to read? Where do you go?
SY: I love to travel. I travel with magazines, in case I'm
distracted in the airports. I love people-watching in airports. I love to bring along
books that I can get lost in during a plane ride. The FAN CHILD by Thar Ben Jaloon I read
on a bus, and it was a wonderful experience -- I started reading it when I got on and lost
all sense of time. I would recommend that as a great book to travel with.
Amie from Ithaca, NY: I identified with a lot of SOUL KISS. When I was really young, I wanted to marry my father -- my brother planned on marrying my mother. It was sort of a competition that my parents encouraged. Did you find that many people have similar experiences?
SY: Yes. That was a part of these ideas staying with me --
in conversations about what is erotic, I was often surprised by people's answers. Someone
once told me that they found their mother's ears erotic; as a child, they would caress
their mother's ears, and that memory was very strong, very erotic. But most people don't
want to talk about that kind of eroticism between a parent and a child because it can be
very dangerous, due to the issue of boundaries. There are some boundaries that you can't
cross.
QJay from Brooklyn: I have yet to read your novel, but I am curious -- how much of a role does race play in SOUL KISS?
SY: Mariah identifies as African American, because the
community where she is raised is a segregated town in the South. But her mother talks to
her about her Cherokee grandfather. Race is a very complicated and complex issue. Her
father's last name is Santos, but he doesn't really talk about his background. Race is an
important issue in the world, and the characters deal with it on many levels of the book.
Jessica H. from Clayton, MO: Did you find that you had problems being pigeonholed by your publishing house or by reviewers as an African American writer? The themes in SOUL KISS are so universal that I feel that this limitation would be a shame.
SY: I haven't felt limited as a writer, no, and I don't allow other people to limit me.
Mitch from Bridgewater, NJ: What's your take on the state of theater in this country? What's the last play that you've seen? Are there any specific playwrights that are under the general public's radar that you think will (or deserve to) get noticed?
SY: The last play that just knocked me out of my chair was
Paula Vogel's "How I Learned to Drive." It is an amazing piece of theater, and
encourages me in terms of the state of theater.
Megan from Virginia: Sexuality seems to be an issue you explore throughout SOUL KISS. Do you think all people have the potential to be as "experimental" as Mariah? What stops them?
SY: Yes, I think all people have the potential to be as
experimental as Mariah is. What stops them is a society that is threatened by different
kinds of sexuality.
LSBandle from New Haven, CT: Was it hard to leave Mariah behind once you finished the novel? Do you have in mind what happens to Mariah after the book concludes?
SY: It was like letting go of a child, I imagine. I had
invented and created this character, brought her to life, watched her grow up, laughed
with her, cried with her, but I had to eventually let her go because there were other
characters waiting for me to bring them to life, other stories I wanted to tell.
Belu from New Orleans: Whose writing has (and still does) inspire you?
SY: Toni Morrison will always inspire me, and so many
others before her, after her -- but for me, she stands out as a very big influence on my
life.
Frank-bones from LES: What's next for you?
SY: I am working on a novel set in Paris, one of my
favorite places on the planet.
Moderator: Thanks for joining us this evening -- and thank you, Shay Youngblood, for answering our questions.
SY: Thank you, too -- I had a great time, and you asked interesting questions. Thanks for logging on!
To Shay Youngblood page on the AALBC web site