Rosie Rowell
About Author
Rosie Rowell was born and grew up in Cape Town, South Africa. After completing a BA degree in English and Economics at the University of Cape Town, Rosie arrived in the UK on a short working holiday and never quite managed to leave. She now lives in in the wilds of West Sussex with her husband and three children, but returns to South Africa as often as the bank balance will allow.
She completed a MA in Creative and Life Writing at Goldsmiths University of London. Her first novel, Leopold Blue, was published by Hot KeyBooks in 2014 and went on to win the Branford Boase Award for new writers. Her second novel, Almost Grace, was published by Hot Key Books in 2015.
Interview
LEOPOLD BLUE
PUBLISHED BY HOT KEY BOOKS
OCTOBER 2015
Here, Sarah McInerney interviews Rosie Rowell about her debut novel Leopold Blue, which won the Branford Boase Award this summer. The award is given to debut authors and their editors.
The novel, which is set in 1990's South Africa, explores what happens when 15 year-old Meg Bergman - who is bored and lonely - makes friends with Xanthe, a girl who is new to the neighbourhood, until their friendship is disrupted by the return of Meg's old childhood friend, Simon.
Rosie Rowell answered the following questions about her writing and Leopold Blue:
Q: How did it feel to win this year's Branford Boase prize?
A: I can't tell you how much it means. To have your work acknowledged by such a fantastic panel of judges is a special thing indeed.
The wonderful thing about the Branford Boase award is that it acknowledges the special relationship between the writer and editor. My editor Emily Thomas was fantastic. She taught me so much about the process of editing, always with warmth and wisdom.
Q: What was your inspiration to write the winning book, Leopold Blue?
A: The setting of the book, both time and place, were the real triggers for me. I spent three years as a child in a tiny town very much like Leopold and wanted to try and capture the essence of such a community.
I also wanted to capture that moment of South African history. We were on the verge of great change - the end of apartheid and the birth of the 'New South Africa' - but there was huge uncertainty about our future attached to the change and, for many people, a great deal of fear.
Q: Why did you choose to write from the perspective of a teenage girl? Did you feel that it was easy to connect with this age range?
A: Meg's voice was very strong in my head from the beginning. I like her honesty - the fact that she knows her mother is trying to help people but she would far rather Viv were simply a normal mum. I am interested in how the children of 'good' people feel about their parents.
Perhaps part of me is stuck in teenager mode, but I didn't have to dig very deep to find all those stored-up emotions waiting to come out!
Q: What were you like as a teenager and how would you describe your own teenage years?
A: I was far too sensitive and self-conscious for my own good as a teenager and as a result missed out on having a lot of fun. But then I suppose I'd say the same thing about my twenties and thirties!
I grew up in a white, middle class environment in the last years of the apartheid regime and was therefore in a very sheltered and privileged position. As such we were rather naive compared to most teenagers.
Q: The struggle to fit in and the message of being yourself is shown in this novel, do you have any other guidance for teenage readers?
A: Being yourself is probably the bravest and the most difficult thing about being a person - but has such rewards. It's not something that is confined to your teenage years either - it's a challenge we face throughout our lives.
There are so many conflicting messages and pressures bombarding young adults today, but if you can somehow see it for what it is - commercialised noise - as opposed to the truth, you can take the power out of it.
Q: The timing of Meg's teenage rebellion collides with the importance of doing well in exams and school. Is the balance of a social life whilst maintaining good grades something that you feel contemporary teenagers struggle with?
A: Yes, I believe it is. The pressures and diversions of social media as a start is something that we didn't have to face (for which I'm eternally grateful!). First-world society is that much faster and more demanding than it was when I was at school.
I think teenagers also have much higher expectations around their social lives than we did (a dark and dingy school disco was about as exciting as it got!)
Q: The political history of South Africa and racial divides are touched upon in this novel. How much research did you need to do into this place and period?
A: I lived it as opposed to researched it. Many of my characters were plucked from the small town we lived in. My father was the Anglican vicar there; his congregation was full of wonderful people like Marta.
From the outset I wanted to write about people who were swept along with change rather than the change-makers, so I suppose I was concentrating on human nature.
Q: What was the significance of setting Meg's mother at tension with her English life in the past and South African life in the present?
A: I was playing around with the notion of bringing up children in a country that is not your own and what that means to the child and the parent, as I am doing the same in reverse. I think it is a tension that many families feel as there is so much global migration these days.
Q: Your focus on the maternal emotion of 'losing' your child as they go into adolescence is thematic with both Meg and Simon's mothers. Although Meg and her mother resolve their differences, will Simon and Marta ever be able to connect with one another after his privileged education and travels?
A: I don't know. Simon's story stays with me as I fear I didn't do him justice in the book and because his future is playing out now. I wonder about him as a grown man - where he would decide to settle, whom he would marry. Again, it is the situation where children have such different life experiences from their parents.
I think that Marta's influence and guidance would be strong enough to draw him back to her, but they would have to forge a different type of relationship.
Q: Despite the mutual attraction between Meg and Simon, you decided to leave their relationship open ended. Did you deliberately avoid focusing on their future together?
A: Yes, definitely. Any other outcome would have been unrealistic for both of them. I could see something happening between them in the future, perhaps if they both spent time living in London, for example (which is something many South Africans do after university). I think they would need to be in a neutral environment for a decent chance at a relationship.
Q: You leave Meg's future open-ended; do you have a sense of what Meg might do next? Are you planning a sequel?
I don't have any plans for a sequel, although I do imagine scenarios. That's the trouble with characters that live in your head - they never really fade away, even when you're working on other books. It can get very crowded!
I imagine Meg wanting to go to university and travel as soon as possible, and then missing home a great deal!
Q: Your other novel, Almost Grace, is also set in South Africa. Are you planning a third in the same location? Why does South Africa play such an important part in your novels?
A: I'm beginning work on my third and as yet haven't decided where to place it. Because I grew up in South Africa and deep down still view it as home, it felt natural to set the first two books there. I hope that underneath the layers of setting the emotions and themes of the books are universal.
Q: Having lived in South Africa, what do you miss most about it now that you are living in England?
A: The sun! The beaches! The wine!
South Africa is a very young country and the arts scene and cultural dialogue there at the moment is very dynamic and evolving. I miss being an active part of that.
Q: Are you writing full time? Where do you do your writing?
A: Yes, I've just started doing a creative wring PhD at Goldsmiths College, so I will be very busy for the next few years. I find that I can't write at home, so I tend to work in libraries or sometimes coffee shops. When I'm up in London I love working at the British Library.
Q: What are your favourite escapes from writing?
A: Sunshine, but when that's in short supply, I love losing myself in a good movie. My children are my very favourite escape, and they are never in short supply. We live in the Sussex countryside, which makes for great dogwalks. And I read a lot (as you would hope), both young adult and adult fiction.
Leopold Blue
