Ellen Meeropol
Ellen Meeropol is the author of four novels, Her Sister’s Tattoo, Kinship of Clover, On Hurricane Island, and House Arrest. Recent and forthcoming essay and story publications include Lit Hub, Solstice, Lilith, Ms. Magazine, Mom Egg Review, The Boston Globe, and The Writers Chronicle. Ellen is a founding member of Straw Dog Writers Guild and leads their Social Justice Writing project.
Twitter: @ellenmeeropol
Instagram: @ellenmeeropol
Is there another profession you would like to try?
Writing is my third profession: I was a visual artist in my teens and early twenties. Then I worked as a nurse, and nurse practitioner, for 30 years before beginning to write seriously, making me a literary late bloomer. I loved being a nurse, and still do art for my own pleasure, but writing became the most important. Who knows what’s next?
What’s the oddest thing a reader has ever asked you?
When a reader asked what influence my previous career as a nurse had on my writing, I didn’t have a good answer. I had never thought about it but I realized that what I loved about being a nurse was the combination of empathy and nosiness. The process of empathizing with my patients, trying to see the world through their eyes, is similar to my approach to character development. As a writer I work to understand the “beings” who wander into my brain and take up residence, to help them develop personalities that serve themselves and the story. Plus, I’m nosy. I like to watch other people and figure out what they’re feeling. If they won’t share, I imagine it. I like to deconstruct and manipulate those feelings too, but I try to limit that to my characters. To the woman who asked the question five years ago, I would answer that being a writer, like being a nurse, gives me the opportunity and the privilege of sticking my nose into the business of others with as much respect and curiosity and skill and love as I can muster.
Have you ever experienced Imposter Syndrome?
Of course, I have. I wonder if there’s a writer anywhere who hasn’t experienced the awful sinking feeling that her work sucks. That she doesn’t deserve success and might as well quit right now. I know it sounds pathetic, but I have experienced those feelings on a fairly regular basis. I suspect many of us have. There’s no cure, either. You just listen to music, maybe dance a little, or go for a walk, or hug a beloved person or pet. Then you get back to work.
Is there a genre of music that influences your writing/thinking? Do you listen to music while you write?
I rarely listen to music while actually writing but listening to music often evokes those sparks of imagination that lead to writing. Working on my new novel, I listened to the rock music of the late sixties, the time and setting of the story. Music is important to my characters, and several singers and songs wove their way into the story. In fact, the two main characters argue about their favorite singers – Joan Baez versus Bob Dylan – and those choices helped me understand and develop their characters.
Is there a work of art that you love?
There is a painting I particularly love. It’s a large canvas in earth tones showing a crowd of workers walking toward the viewer; one of the people in the front row is a woman carrying an infant. I saw a print of it 30 years ago and took a photo but couldn’t find any information about it. So, I incorporated it into a novel. My main character loved the painting. She particularly identified with the mother, who she named Hannah. As my character tried to figure out how to balance her own political activism with caring for her infant, she communed with Hannah and her striking comrades. Years later in Milan, I learned that the painting is titled “The Fourth Estate” and was painted by the Italian artist Giuseppe Pellizza da Volpedo about 1900. That novel, Her Sister’s Tattoo, is being published this month and a print of [the painting] hangs on the wall of my writing room.
