A long time ago a lady walked into my shop and asked me,
‘Are you the blogger?’ It was probably the most thrilling thing to happen in my
week.
Years later I re-encountered her on Twitter and found out that she was
the writer, Felicity Hayes-McCoy.
Her book, ‘The House on an Irish Hillside’
has just been published by Hodder & Stoughton. It tells her story of leaving the hectic
pace of the city to return to Ireland and make a new life in the stunning
Dingle peninsula. For me, it offered a wonderful escape during a weekend when I
was craving a break from London. I can still taste the crab claws cooked in
butter and hear the sound of fiddles drifting out into the star-lit night.
You said you weren’t
a book person and yet you appear to have written a book. Is it secretly
something you’ve always wanted to do?
I started my
professional career in the theatre and my writing’s largely been for broadcast
media so as a writer I haven’t thought of myself as a book person. But I
studied English and Irish literature at university and I’ve always been a
reader. I think my work’s been a marriage of two strands in my cultural
inheritance, the oral, Irish-language, tradition and the literary, English
language, one. Up to now I’ve mainly been interested in the possibilities of
the spoken word. Maybe now I’m moving towards a deeper exploration of the
written one.
What
would you say is the message of this book?
I didn’t write it
with a sense of having a message. But I love one of the reader reviews on Amazon,
which says ‘This book is not about escaping to a 'better' place but about
living as richly as possible where ever that may be...’ Dividing my life between Bermondsey and the Dingle peninsula gives me a
deeper awareness of both.
Did you keep a diary
of the events that happen in the book or do you just have an incredible memory?
I don’t keep a diary
and I do tend to shape and hold whole paragraphs, and even pages, in my head
before writing them down. I think that’s a result of experiencing a lot of
storytelling before learning to read. The book’s partly about the belief that
shared memory binds communities together in a web of individual awareness. The
ancient Celts, who actively disapproved of writing things down, used memory as
a tool for preserving and debating their world view. And communal memory’s
still highly prized in the native Irish tradition.
How do you write? (In short burst, long stints, every day...?)
Whatever it takes to
hit a deadline.
You mention in the book
that once your husband (an opera director) drove you nuts playing the same piece of music over and
over again and you had to build another room... is there any music you can
listen to when you’re writing?
No!
Where (and what time) do you write best?
As long as I have
silence and my desk faces a blank wall I’m happy. I can’t write in the
evenings, though. If I do I’m still wide awake at 4.00 am, lying in the dark, shaping
sentences in my head.
There is Irish in the
book (and I didn’t dare pronounce any of it!) I kept wondering, how does your
husband cope when you're in Dingle? Does he understand it? Do you think he will ever speak it?!
Right now he
understands a lot more than he’ll speak. He’s eager to learn because he hates
the idea that people will switch to English when he’s present. Musicians do
more playing than talking though, so sessions tend to be fine.
Is there going to be
a sequel?
There are plenty more
stories to tell!
Do you have any tips
for aspiring writers?
There’s a wonderful
1950s book of career advice, edited by Noel Streatfeild, with chapter titles
like ‘You Might Be A Secretary’ and ‘Let’s Take A Look At Nursing’. A highly
successful writer herself, and clearly a woman who took no prisoners, she lists
the qualities needed to become a writer, including‘...a faultless ear for dialogue... a vivid imagination’... and ‘...ruthless individualism.’ Then she
really gets into her stride. ‘Let me
advise you, unless your parents are rich enough (and likely to stay rich
enough) to support you whenever you are not employed or selling your work, to
have something you can do on the side. You may think now that you won’t mind
being poor if only you can give your talent full scope. Maybe, but all the
same, before developing your talent, find a nice humdrum job that will support
you in hard times.’
Anything else you’d
like to add....
Personally, I never
took Noel Streatfeild’s advice but I might have been better advised to!
Below you can watch the Trailer of 'The House on an Irish Hillside'...
