Word from the Rock
Newfoundland
writer Bill Rowe has written seven critically acclaimed books, including Clapp’s Rock;
The
Temptation of Victor Galanti; Danny Williams: The War With Ottawa; Danny
Williams, Please Come Back; Rosie O’Dell, and his latest effort, The Premiers Joey and Frank: Greed, Power,
and Lust (Flanker Press). Recently we spoke with him about the
new work and about his passion for his vocation.
What
inspired you to write this book?
BR:
The Premiers Joey and Frank: Greed, Power, and Lust is a non-fiction book
comprising my memoirs from the period when I worked closely, with and against,
Premier Joey Smallwood and Premier Frank Moores of Newfoundland and Labrador.
The motivation and inspiration to write it were provided by those often bizarre
experiences.
Did the work come together quickly or did you really need to work at it?
BR: After
a lifetime of political involvement and observation, I found that the work came
together quickly, once I decided to write it.
What
was the most challenging aspect of the process?
BR: The
book is not a work of history or historical research, but contains my personal
memories of events and characters, supplemented by conversations with former
colleagues and adversaries, and notes from my private files. The most
challenging aspect was striving to remember everything important or interesting
that happened, and making certain that the telling was frank and unbiased.
What
was the most rewarding part of the experience?
BR: Most
rewarding was the flood of full memories that came back to me, many of which
were highly amusing, as well as traumatic and bizarre, plus the knowledge that
I’ve recorded events and characteristics of the players that might otherwise be
lost.
What
did you learn during process?
BR: With
this book, my seventh, I re-learned that writing is always hard and
challenging, as well as extremely fulfilling.
What
has the response to the work been like so far?
BR: The
response has been gratifying, both in personal encounters with readers, and in
sales. As I write this, the book is on the Globe & Mail bestsellers
list for Canadian non-fiction.
What
made you want to be a writer?
BR: Something
innate and mysterious, and possibly self-destructive.
Are
they the same reasons you do it today?
BR: Yes.
Is
your creative process more one of inspiration or perspiration?
BR: If
inspiration comes to me at all, it is probably a matter of pure, dumb luck.
Geniuses may experience more of it than the rest of us. But for all of us, the
hard work and the long hours - the perspiration – would be the keys to creativity
and production.
In
your estimation, what makes a good book?
BR: I
can only tell if a book is any good by its impact on me, after years of wide,
deep reading in many genres. Most of Shakespeare’s plays make a good book, and
some get better and better with my passing years. It is the same with some of
John Updike’s novels and Alice Monroe’s stories.
What
are your thoughts on the current state of literature in Atlantic Canada?
BR: There
seems to be a golden age of literature going on here, especially among my own gang,
the Newfoundlanders.
What
can we do better?
BR: Hard
to say. What makes a golden age, or a silver age, or a wooden age of
literature, or of creativity generally, in a place and time? What caused
Periclean Athens, Augustan Rome, Medicean Florence, Elizabethan London? I don’t
know. Perhaps the adjective in front of each city had something to do with it.
Do
you have any advice for aspiring writers?
BR: Read
wide and deep, and write long and hard. Make each sentence the best you can –
never get lazy and whisper to yourself, “That’s good enough,” as we’re all
tempted to do.
What's
next on your creative agenda?
BR: A
novel, and then another warts-and-all work of non-fiction on the next batch of
interesting Premiers of Newfoundland and Labrador.
