Posted by dj on October 23, 2000, at 11:58:29
From an interview in today's Globe and Mail:
http://www.globeandmail.com/gam/TopGlobeReview/20001023/RVROWL.html
"Depression and death are central themes in the Harry Potter books, even though they are billed as simple adventure stories...What she loves about Harry as a hero is his vulnerability and his belief in hope. That is what makes him so susceptible to the Dementors, vile creatures that suck hope out of the mouths of their victims. Rowling created the Dementors to symbolize depression, the malaise that nearly toppled her half a dozen years ago.
"I don't mean feeling sad," she says. "That is a normal, healthy emotion. Depression is losing the ability to feel certain emotions and one of them is hope."
For her daughter's sake, she sought counselling. "She was my touchstone. If it hadn't been for her, I probably would never have had the courage to go to the doctor and say I needed to talk about things."
Another salvation was writing.
Rowling had invented Harry Potter in a flash on a train journey from Manchester to London about six months after her mother died. But she began to write much more purposefully, sitting in cafés and writing in longhand while her daughter slept. "Writing was very helpful to my sanity. It gave me something to focus on."
She admits that she was lucky to be able to write, even when she was classified as clinically depressed, and that she could find the discipline to turn off the television at night and to snatch whatever time she could when her daughter was sleeping during the day. "I couldn't afford the luxury of writer's block. I had two hours max."
She says she has probably never been as productive since then, in terms of the number of words she produces every day."If you know that she might not nap tomorrow, you are going to seize the opportunity. So out of adversity . . .,"
poster:dj
thread:1502
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/social/20001011/msgs/1502.html