Tim Parks / Features / Untitled Books

"My suspicions are that the motives are not honourable."

Tim Parks

Tim Parks' is the author of several novels, including Tongues of Flame and Europa, as well as non-fiction and essays. His most recent book, Teach Us to Sit Still, traces his attempts to understand a cripplingly painful medical condition, and seek relief and recovery.

Where are you right now?

I'm in a rather drab office at IULM University in Milan, where I run a little post grad degree in translation. It would be hard to imagine a less memorable room.

Where do you write?

Wherever I am when I have a couple of spare hours for writing. That mainly means my office in Verona, a room almost as nondescript as this. But the train is also good, between Verona and Milan. Really, anywhere where you can concentrate.

How do you write?

Essays and non-fiction I usually write straight onto the laptop, re-elaborating endlessly. But when it comes to a novel I work by hand. I love the silence and the rhythm writing by hand. I start each day transcribing the previous day's work onto the computer, rereading, editing, rewriting. That gets me over the early morning inertia. Then I switch back to paper to push the book on.

What keeps you writing?

This is such a good question I have no answer. My suspicions are that the motives are not honourable. I certainly yearn to come up with a book that feels truly different.

Who do you write for?

Those who will read what I want to write.

Do you discuss your work with anyone?

Ever since we've had email I've been running things past my older brother, a painter who lives in the States. John is a wonderful reader because he says when he likes and when he doesn't like things in the simplest way.

How do you know if your work is good?

I'm not sure if I can go with the premise behind this question. Do I know? Really? Sometimes I think I know. Very often I change my mind. But I do know when a piece of writing is finished. I can do no more. And that's far more useful than knowing if it's good.

Do you have any unwritten characters in mind?

I do, yes. I have a couple of characters waiting for a book. I have some story ideas waiting for characters. I do my best to introduce them to each other, but these are not things one wishes to hurry.

Which book do you wish you'd written?

There were moments when I wished I had written Coetzee's Disgrace, Or something like it. In many ways the book felt so close. Or Berhard's Concrete. But in general what you long to do is something that's supremely your own and entirely new.

What is your literary guilty pleasure?

I don't understand this question. I can't see why a literary pleasure should be guilty. Perhaps you mean am I ashamed of liking some book or other. No. I do have a divided mind over many things, but not over the books I like. When I like a book I shout it. Same when I hate it.

Which writer made you want to write?

A toss up between Henry Green (Partygoing) and Samuel Beckett (Molloy)

Who's the most exciting author writing today?

How could there ever be a single answer to that question? It smacks of blurb talk.

If you weren't writing you'd be...?

God knows. A lawyer. I've always envied criminal lawyers. Or a teacher, which I am anyway. I love teaching. I love being away from writing for a couple of days a week. I love it when one of my ex-students gets a good book to translate and does well.

What next?

I'm excited by the first fifty or so pages of a novel I've written. So I suppose it'll be that. Provisionally titled: In the Dhamma Kitchen.

...........................................................................................................

Teach Us to Sit Still is published by Harvill Secker.

...........................................................................................................

Thursday, 5 August, 2010