Five Questions for Marian Pierce

31 Jan 2011 1 Comment

by gaijinmama in Contributors, fiction, Tokyo

Marian Pierce’s short stories have been published in Portland Monthly, GQ magazine, The Japan Times, The Mississippi Review, Puerto del Sol, STORY, Scribner’s Best of the Fiction Workshops 1997, and other venues. She was shortlisted for the 2008 David Wong Fellowship at the University of East Anglia, for an author writing about the Far East. Her story “Tokyo Pleasureland” appears in Yomimono #15.

Photo: Janice Pierce Photography

What was the inspiration for your story?

 In 2005 I spent 3 months in Tokyo doing research for a novel I have been working on, oh, forever! On an exceptionally hot August day, I took a break and went to Asakusa Kannon Temple. I sat down under a ginko tree next to an old man, and remarked in Japanese to him how hot it was. We started conversing, and he told me about his experiences during the firebombing of Tokyo. He also handed me a fan at one point, which is described in the story.

The Swedish man in the story is based on someone who I talked to at the “Gaijin House” I was staying in in Saitama at the time. He was just as girl crazy as described!

Describe your writing space.

 
When I write by hand I lie on my couch, sit at my kitchen table, or sit cross legged on the floor or a patch of grass somewhere. When writing at my computer, I sit at little desk which faces a bulletin board filled with photos of friends and family.

What are you working on now?

 A novel about, in part, the crash of JAL Flight 123 in 1985.

What’s the last book you’ve read?

 
 Under the Banyan Tree by R.K. Narayan. I love Narayan’s humor, the compassion that infuses his writing, and his deceptively simple style.

What is your favorite place in Japan?

That’s a hard one, but I absolutely loved Yakushima Island and the ancient Jomon sugi trees.

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