Interview: Sam Savage, author of 'Firmin:

I posted here earlier about how much I thoroughly enjoyed Sam Savage's wonderful novel 'Firmin.'

Though this is only March, I wouldn't be surprised if this intelligent, affecting novel winds up making my list of Top Ten favorite reads of 2007. It's hard to imagine reading any nine novels that could knock this one out of the running. In fact, the book's still sitting here, beside my computer, a constant reminder of how much I like just having it in my line of sight.

I was honored that Sam Savage very kindly agreed to answer a few interview questions for me:

LG: When did you decide you wanted to be a writer? What inspired you?

SS: I grew up in a household where writers were accorded great respect. I first wanted to be a journalist. I wrote poetry from an early age, and still do. When I was young I had a very romantic idea of writing, that it was all about inspiration, and it took me a long time to become reconciled to the inevitable drudgery that goes along with it.

LG: What writers do you admire? Are you an avid reader?

SS: Among writers of the recent past, I love Nabokov, Sorrentino, Gaddis, Vonnegut at his best, Far Tortuga of Peter Matthiessen. I periodically reread A Farewell to Arms just for the pleasure of the sentences. And there are poets, especially Yeats, W. C. Williams, and Berryman. I read more slowly as a grow older, but a read every day. I would love to be able to give up writing and just read instead.

LG:  Do you keep a strict writing schedule? Do you have any writing rituals, or habits, that keep you focused?

SS: I write, or pretend to write (sit at the desk anyway), about four hours a day. I do it in a tiny basement room, without music. Some of my best discoveries, however, come during my insomniac hours in the middle of the night.

LG: What inspired you to write a story about a rat who loves books? Was there something about rats in particular that beguiled you?

SS: I began the novel, wrote the first few pages, had a complete feel for the character that was speaking, without knowing that this speaker was a rat. But once I saw he was a rat, I also realized that this figure was the perfect vehicle for the main themes of the book, muteness, social exclusion, and unappeasable longing.

LG: How much research did you need to do for your book?

SS: Almost none. I actually remember Scollay Square and the wonderful Brattle Book Shop that was located there. I read a couple of books on the history of the area. I read an article about rats in an encyclopedia. And that was it.

LG: What's next for you after 'Firmin'? Are you working on another book?

SS: I have just completed another novel. I still am not sure if I like it. It’s a difficult moment, since I know from long experience that as soon as I finish anything I feel like throwing it in the trash. Firmin only narrowly escaped that fate.

LG: What advice would you give to aspiring writers? What advice has helped you in your own career?

SS: My "career" would scarcely be a good example for anyone, since I had been writing for forty years before finishing my first novel. My only advice would be to forget about "career," and instead try not to write, and then if despite your best efforts you keep on writing, you’ll probably find your way. I never got any advice that helped me, which is a pity, since I went down so many dead-end roads. On the other hand, it probably had to be that way.

LG: As a public library employee I'm compelled to ask, what role have libraries played in your love of books and reading?

SS: I spent the first years of my life in a house that was right across the street from a tiny public library. Before I got my own private room to write in I used to write in libraries. I have written in the Bibliothèque nationale in Paris, the British Museum, Widener Library at Harvard, Sterling Library at Yale. I live a few blocks from a small branch library in Madison, and I often go there. I wish there were twice as many.

Sam Savage, author of Firmin: Adventures of a Metropolitan Lowlife

Published by Coffee House Press

ISBN: 978-1-56689-181-3