The next author in the ‘Few of my favourite things…’
2015 HNSA Conference interview series is Johanna Nicholls
who is participating in our Tall Tales
and True: How Storytellers Imagine History
panel on Saturday 21st March 2015.
Johanna Nicholls
Johanna comes from a theatrical family. She was a journalist
and magazine feature writer in Sydney, Melbourne and London. In television she
worked as a researcher/writer and Head Script Editor of Drama at the Australian
Broadcasting Corporation. Johanna has lived in England, Italy and Greece. Her
home is an 1830 convict-built sandstone cottage in Birchgrove, Sydney where she
is currently writing her fourth Australian historical novel. Her first saga, Ironbark, was published by Simon and
Schuster in Australia and New Zealand in 2009 and 2010. Ghost Gum Valley was published in 2012 and 2013. The Lace Balcony is her third novel to
have been translated into German and published in Germany, Austria and
Switzerland.
Johanna,
please share with us what is or was your favourite…
Book
as a child and as a teenager?
As a child I had problems learning to read. When books were
read to me I created vivid pictures in my head (a process that later proved
invaluable as a drama Script Editor in TV and also because I always ‘think in
pictures’ when writing novels). Little Women was a milestone – the first book I
ever read by myself.
As a teenager I read at random everything in Dad’s
theatrical library from Shakespeare to circuses. (A biography of 19th century
English tragedian Edmund Kean inspired me to dramatise his final stage
performance in my second historical novel, Ghost
Gum Valley). I also read ‘hot books’ from the local library (no doubt tame
by Fifty Shades of Grey standards as
seduction scenes were left to the imagination ending with ‘…..’ My dream to
write books was spurred by young Francoise Sagan’s Bonjour Tristesse, Ruth Park’s Poor
Man’s Orange – and the publication of my first short story at 17.
Ironbark by Johanna Nicholls
Author/authors?
I have too many author friends to risk naming contemporary
favourites. Jane Austen’s novels sit on my shelves like old friends waiting to
be re-read. I am bemused by the obsession to name The Great Australian Novel. There are so many great Australian novels that rank under the umbrella of that
title. The first Australian historical writers to inspire me were Eleanor Dark
(The Timeless Land) and Henry Handel Richardson. I
recently re-read The Fortunes of Richard
Mahoney to see if it had the same impact as on first reading – it did!)
Period
of history?
The past has always been a magnet for me. I’m passionate
about Australian history. In school it seemed dull compared with British and
European history – until my Dad convinced me our history is unique. Although
our recorded European history is short in time, it’s rich in diversity, legends
and untapped narrative veins. For me researching, writing and mentally living
in the 19th century is as exciting as fossicking for gold. Our
colonial era’s surprising range of nationalities led me to explore diverse
cultural backgrounds of those who came willingly – or in chains. Romany gypsy
Keziah Stanley is central to Ironbark. Characters
in all my novels spring from every corner of the British Isles, Ireland, the German lands, America, India,
France, Corsica,
Greece – and in The Lace Balcony from Prussia and the Isle of Man.
Character
in one of your own books?
My characters are like my children – I can’t play
favourites. In the writing of each book I ‘give birth’ to a new set of
headstrong people who prove determined to live their own lives, despite my
well-laid plans for them. I feel like a parent who knows what’s best for their
children – but they go their own sweet way. I can’t make any characters fall in
love against their will. For instance in The
Lace Balcony, the beautiful young courtesan, Vianna Francis, known as the
notorious ‘Sydney Venus’, has been trained to exploit powerful, wealthy men.
Love is out of the equation – until Felix L’Estrange and Mungo Quayle, two
young rivals from childhood, become obsessed with possessing her.
While researching Vianna’s background I was intrigued by the
parallel between the lives of historical courtesans – and modern young women.
Respectable women in society often had arranged marriages and by law
relinquished fortune, property and custody of children to their husband. In
contrast, leading courtesans in the demi-monde,
chose their own lovers, controlled their fertility as well as their destiny –
but often paid a high price for their ‘modern’ freedom.
The Lace Balcony by Johanna Nicholls
Scene
you enjoyed writing?
To be honest, all of them – or they wouldn’t end up in the
final draft of the published book. If I’m not enjoying the writing journey, I
can’t expect my readers to be engaged in my characters’ lives. But I
particularly enjoy writing scenes from both female and male perspectives;
scenes in which fictional characters interact with historical figures. In The Lace Balcony this includes the
autocratic NSW Governor Ralph Darling, emancipist entrepreneur Mrs Mary Reibey,
Captain John Piper, the ‘Prince of Australia’, and the notorious Commandant of
Moreton Bay, Captain Patrick Logan.
I am fascinated by the early emergence of the Australian
identity and our peculiar sense of humour. I enjoy writing scenes with veins of
humour – dark gallows humour, romantic comedy of errors, or ghostly
‘hallucinations’ – to balance the brutal events of the penal colony era. I
don’t want to telegraph plot twists, but there is a chain of events in The Lace Balcony, that culminates in
complex choices. I had no idea what was going to happen next until the images
and words shot up on my computer screen as rapidly as if I were watching a
movie. None of the central protagonists, Vianna, Felix or Mungo, knew the
outcome. Neither did I.
Place
to write?
I envy writers like my husband, Brian Nicholls, who can
write anywhere, on the back of envelopes in coffee shops, in transit on planes,
or in the Outback. I’ve been known to pass friends and family in the street,
because I’m totally absorbed inside my ‘writer’s bubble’ playing out scenes in
my head. My central creative space is the home office in my convict-built
sandstone cottage, seated with a view of the garden and no activity to distract
me except visits from a magpie who has adopted my garden. For hours each day I
am locked in front of my computer screen, book-ended by two walls of research books,
and knee-deep in boxes of research I never quite finish filing.
Step
in the process of writing? E.g. researching, drafting, editing etc
I begin when the central idea for a book won’t leave me
alone. Initial stages of research are often like playing blind man’s buff,
reading fascinating documents, biographies, and newspapers – not sure where
they will lead me. I haunt the Mitchell Library, the Caroline Simpson Library
and Research Centre, my local Balmain Library and fire off emails to historical
sources. The most difficult early decision is to pin down the precise span of
years that will pay off the central story to best advantage. It is a temptation
to go off on a tangent, excited by some avenue that later needs to be reined in
to avoid pulling the central narrative off kilter.
The initial exploration of characters makes me nervous –
until the moment they leap off the page and I know they are leading their own
lives. First drafts are ‘white heat writing’ – I am burning to get it down. I
wear my ‘editor’s hat’ on later drafts.
Some authors use a team of researchers. I love to do my own.
There’s nothing like standing in the place where history was made. Old
buildings ‘speak to me’ of the past. I visit precious colonial buildings that
have survived being demolished; hamlets and ghost towns off the back roads of Australia, and for The Lace Balcony, Moreton
Bay, the Illawarra and
the magical Isle of Man.
The editing process is a blessing when given sympathetic,
fresh insight from an editor. The trick is to remain true to my characters. By
this stage it’s their lives, their story more than mine. The most
difficult moment is letting go of the manuscript to the printer. I feel like a
surrogate mother who has born a child knowing it must be given up for adoption
– and loved by others, but I feel an acute sense of loss …until that glorious
moment when I see ‘the babe’ in book stores. It is also a thrill to hold copies
of the German editions of my books – in which my characters can speak fluent
German – although I can’t.
Ghost Gum Valley by Johanna Nicholls
Method
of writing i.e. longhand or typing?
Longhand I use only to jot down bedside notes that wake me during
the night. I bless the inventor of the word processor because I cut and polish
endlessly. All three of my sagas were initially longer than the published
versions. I understand Charles Dickens wrote many of his books in serial form
and was paid by the line. In retrospect I wonder if some of his books wouldn’t be more engaging to today’s readers if
he had had a good editor on board.
I am totally awed by the creative energy of previous
centuries of authors forced to write in longhand. I understand Goethe rewrote
the two parts of the Faust story over a period of some fifty-seven years
in which he produced a massive body of literature. How much more would he have
written with a computer?!
TV
program /movie?
I love contemporary gritty Australian and British TV series which
contain veins of humour, and leave something
to the imagination. (I don’t enjoy watching a gory autopsy while I’m eating
pizza). But creations of past eras like Downton
Abbey, are a prime magnet. Classic
movies such as Gone with the Wind,
Casablanca, Caddie, Streetcar Named Desire, Turn of the Screw, Wuthering
Heights, Shakespeare in Love, Wake in Fright – and every version of Pride and Prejudice brings fresh
insight. Future classics? Gosford Park
and Woody Allen’s Midnight in Paris.
Comfort
food?
Any meal shared with good friends, family and
laughter. I’m no prize cook. At home I live on salads, fish and vegetables
galore. Eating out I vote for Mediterranean.
My son and daughter-in-law, actors Nicholas Cassim and Niki Owen, make Greek
and Italian dishes to rival any restaurant.
Johanna has kindly agreed to donate a copy of The Lace Balcony in our Pozible
campaign. Please consider
making a pledge to assist us to monetarily reward our authors.
The Lace Balcony by Johanna Nicholls
Vianna Francis, known in the colony as ‘The Sydney Venus’,
is a notorious young mistress in keeping to a former gentleman convict, who
uses her to entice wealthy men to his gaming tables.
A woman of mystery, Vianna is a magnet for scandal. Was she the mistress of a Royal duke? A lady’s maid who learned the tricks of the world’s oldest profession when in service to a Parisian courtesan? Or the widow of a young man executed on the gallows? Men of high rank are determined to possess this passionate, mercenary beauty.
The L’Estrange half-brothers were born only months apart. One brother is an idealistic dreamer, the other a volatile adventurer. And the rivals have two things in common – a fatal attraction to get-rich schemes that run afoul of the law -- and their obsession with Vianna.
A woman of mystery, Vianna is a magnet for scandal. Was she the mistress of a Royal duke? A lady’s maid who learned the tricks of the world’s oldest profession when in service to a Parisian courtesan? Or the widow of a young man executed on the gallows? Men of high rank are determined to possess this passionate, mercenary beauty.
The L’Estrange half-brothers were born only months apart. One brother is an idealistic dreamer, the other a volatile adventurer. And the rivals have two things in common – a fatal attraction to get-rich schemes that run afoul of the law -- and their obsession with Vianna.
Johanna will be appearing at the 2015 HNSA Conference in the
following panel:
11 am-12 pm Session Three
Tall Tales
and True: How Story Tellers Imagine History
How do
historical novelists weave history into fiction? What draws an author to choose
a particular era, and what research do they undertake to bring past times to
life? Jean Bedford talks with Isolde Martyn, Johanna
Nicholls, Juliet Marillier and Craig Cliff about these
choices.
For more information on all our panels, please visit
our site for programme details.
And you can buy your tickets here.
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2015.
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Here’s a few favourite things for Johanna Nicholls on
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And please take a look at our FREE BOOK OFFERS!
The first 30 ticketholders to purchase a ‘Standard’ Whole Conference Ticket will receive a free copy of either The Lace Balcony by Johanna Nicholls, The King’s Shadow by Barbara Gaskell Denvil or The Island House by Posie Graeme-Evans.
All ticket holders will receive a Momentum ebook bundle in celebration of Felicity Pulman’s launch of Unholy Alliance.
The first 50 fully paid ticket holders will receive a copy of Sherryl Clark’s new book Do You Dare – Jimmy’s War in celebration of her launch.
And please take a look at our FREE BOOK OFFERS!
The first 30 ticketholders to purchase a ‘Standard’ Whole Conference Ticket will receive a free copy of either The Lace Balcony by Johanna Nicholls, The King’s Shadow by Barbara Gaskell Denvil or The Island House by Posie Graeme-Evans.
All ticket holders will receive a Momentum ebook bundle in celebration of Felicity Pulman’s launch of Unholy Alliance.
The first 50 fully paid ticket holders will receive a copy of Sherryl Clark’s new book Do You Dare – Jimmy’s War in celebration of her launch.
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