The Mozart Season (29 page)

What did you want to be when you grew up?

A ballet dancer, ice-skater, circus trapeze acrobat, mommy, violinist.

When did you realize you wanted to be a writer?

Maybe as early as about 4th grade, but the urge was quite vague, and stayed that way for decades.

What's your first childhood memory?

The western summer sunlight coming in huge swaths across our big lawn in the mountains in the late afternoon, my family all busy being alive, our pets somewhere within calling distance, a slight buzzing of insects, tall trees and blue, blue sky, and knowing I was in the right place. Completely unaware that things would ever change.

What's your most embarrassing childhood memory?

If it's the most embarrassing, surely I wouldn't tell it. I must have many of them. I've worked hard at putting them in their places in the deep interior of my mind, and I really don't discuss them.

As a young person, who did you look up to most?

Hmmm. Whom did I look up to most? Probably Yehudi Menuhin, Jascha Heifetz, Eleanor Roosevelt, Elizabeth Taylor, Dwight D. Eisenhower. And Jane Addams, once I read about her in 6th grade in one of those orange biographies written for children.

What was your worst subject in school?

Advanced algebra, for one.

What was your first job?

Summer camp counselor.

How did you celebrate publishing your first book?

I can't for the life of me remember. I suppose my basic discovery of that day was that life was going on utterly as before, without a ripple.

Where do you write your books?

I have written books in several different places. Now, I write in a beautiful, big studio in my home whose windows look out on birds, squirrels, huge cedar trees, and deep sky in all weather.

Where do you find inspiration for your writing?

Wherever I least expect to. But art museums are reliable sources.

Which of your characters is most like you?

None is like me on the outside. Each is quite like me in some rooms of his/her interior.

When you finish a book, who reads it first?

My editor.

Are you a morning person or a night owl?

A morning person.

What's your idea of the best meal ever?

Some marvelous food that's totally new to me, especially if I'm getting to eat it in a country I thought I'd never get to visit.

Which do you like better: cats or dogs?

For me, both cats and dogs are blessings on this earth. I have loved several cats and two dogs so deeply that the mention of their names can bring me to tears.

What do you value most in your friends?

Resilience, adaptability, wisdom, ethics, humor.

Where do you go for peace and quiet?

Art museums, forests, lakes, a swimming pool, a meadow, a beach, my yard.

What makes you laugh out loud?

I usually laugh out loud when I see Shakespeare's comedies performed. “A Midsummer Night's Dream” nearly always makes me roll with laughter.

What's your favorite song?

I have so many, and all of them are classical: concertos, symphonies, sonatas, quintets, quartets.… To name one: Felix Mendelssohn's
Octet for Strings,
which he composed when he was sixteen years old.

Who is your favorite fictional character?

It's a tie between David Copperfield and Wilbur the pig in
Charlotte's Web.

What are you most afraid of?

Being incompetent. And world war.

What time of the year do you like best?

I really love every season, even the most difficult, winter. Summer is easiest to love, and I do.

What is your favorite TV show?

Masterpiece Theatre,
usually. Years ago,
Monty Python's Flying Circus,
which always made me laugh out loud.

If you were stranded on a desert island, who would you want for company?

If I couldn't have my children and grandchildren with me, I'd go for the next best thing, and that would be other musicians—and our instruments—so we could make music together.

If you could travel in time, where would you go?

If I could go with vaccinations and antibiotics, I'd go to the time of Shakespeare, or the times of Bach or Mozart.

What's the best advice you have ever received about writing?

“When a story is in trouble, you will ALWAYS find the source of the trouble in the point of view.” It was said in a voice and accent from the Deep South of the United States, and I might someday find that it was wrong advice, but so far, it has worked.

What do you want readers to remember about your books?

I think readers should get to choose that. Who am I to tell them? But if I get a vote here, I'd like them to notice that my characters try really, really hard in their lives.

What would you do if you ever stopped writing?

Concentrate on my violin lessons, practice more each day, and play lots of chamber music.

What do you like best about yourself?

I think my perseverance.

What is your worst habit?

Hanging on to the memories of really awful things I've done. But maybe that's not the worst; maybe forgetting those awful things would be worse yet.

What do you consider to be your greatest accomplishment?

Rearing my two children, and stopping smoking cigarettes eighteen years ago.

What do you wish you could do better?

Play the violin; think; write.

What would your readers be most surprised to learn about you?

I don't know. Maybe that each book takes me years to write? Or that I practice the violin every morning before beginning to write?

This is a work of fiction. Apart from Ernest Bloch (1880–1959) and other celebrated figures in the world of music, all characters in this story are imaginary. As of this writing, there is no Bloch Competition for Young Musicians of Oregon.

An Imprint of Holtzbrinck Publishers

THE MOZART SEASON. Copyright © 1991 by Virginia Euwer Wolff. All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles or reviews. For information, address Square Fish, 175 Fifth Avenue, New York, NY 10010.

Excerpt from “The Waking” © 1953 by Theodore Roethke. Reprinted by permission of Doubleday, a division of Bantam Doubleday Dell Publishing Group, Inc.

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ISBN-13: 978-0-312-36745-9

ISBN-10: 0-312-36745-7

Originally published in the United States by Henry Holt and Company, LLC

First Square Fish Edition: July 2007

www.squarefishbooks.com

eISBN 9781466887022

First eBook edition: October 2014