This interview originally aired on In the Moment on SDPB Radio.
Kate DiCamillo is one of America's most successful children's authors who has written several best-selling and award-winning books.
The South Dakota Humanities Council chose her book "The Tale of Despereaux" as the 2023 Young Readers One Book, and she joined Lori Walsh on stage at the South Dakota Festival of Books. The audience was packed with teachers and librarians.
They talked about banned books, fairy tales and DiCamillo's new book “The Puppets of Spelhorst."
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Lori Walsh:
I want to invite you into a special listening experience today. We'll begin this hour by bringing you my conversation with author Kate DiCamillo. It was recorded in front of an audience of readers at the South Dakota Festival of Books in Deadwood.
The South Dakota Humanities Council's Young Readers One Book program launched in 2014. It's a program that combines book ownership with face-to-face visits with authors and artists. The selection for 2023 was “The Tale of Despereaux.” The book was honored with the Newbery Medal, the highest prize in children's writing.
Now, in this conversation, we'll talk about how reading to someone can save their life, how telling stories might be our only hope against darkness and how fairy tales give us a way through the woods.
And we'll begin by talking about when Kate DiCamillo visited the east side of the state. Students packed the Washington Pavilion's Great Hall to greet her, and, somehow, she led them all in the most memorable conversation.
Kate DiCamillo:
It was just utterly magical, utterly magical. The kids were so present. There were 900 of them in that auditorium, and they stayed. They made huge connections. We connected. They made big thematic connections. It was magical. And I talk about it all the time, out in the world.
That was also one of my favorite quotes happened in there. A little girl raised her hand in the question and answer period and asked how old I was. And I said, "I'm 50." And she looked at me and she said, "But how did that happen?" And I used that line for the next... And now I'm 59, so it's not as fun. It's like, boy, how did that happen?
Lori Walsh:
Let's hope it keeps happening.
Kate DiCamillo:
Yeah, right. Yeah.
Lori Walsh:
You want it to keep happening and keep happening. And after all the last three or four years that we've been through, we're even more grateful to the things that are still happening.
Kate DiCamillo:
Yeah. And to be together with a group of readers in a room is just a powerful thing. So I'm so grateful to all of y'all for getting up this morning and coming in here and so grateful to you.
Because I woke up and I thought, "What do I do today?" And it's like, "Oh yeah, Lori will be in charge. That's great."
Lori Walsh:
Yeah, we're going to talk to the grownups for a minute in the room because Ann Patchett famously, during the pandemic, went through and read every Kate DiCamillo book to look at the canon, and it gave her delight and comfort and peace. And you are dear friends. Your newest book is dedicated to her. Her newest book is dedicated to you. Adults have known for a long time that you're really writing books for them too.
Kate DiCamillo:
Right, but we needed Ann Patchett to say it for it to be true. Now it's true. Now it's true. That has been one of the great gifts of my adulthood is Ann as a friend.
Lori Walsh:
So, I was asking how many teachers were in the room earlier. How many librarians?
Kate DiCamillo:
Can I see the teachers for a minute? And can I see the librarians too? Teachers and librarians together? Can you leave your hands up if you read to the kids when they come into, can we do a round of applause for those teachers and librarians? It matters so much.
It’s like I was a kid who got read to at home, who had a mom who bought me books, took me to the library and I lived for getting read to in school. And I think you're saving somebody's life, and they're not going to be able to tell you that until they're 40 and then they won't find you.
So yeah, I'll tell you now.
Lori Walsh:
I want to add booksellers or independent bookstore owners to the list.
Kate DiCamillo:
Oh yes, absolutely.
Lori Walsh:
Because my brother, we'll pretend that he's here. He was a bookseller his whole life in Minnesota. He worked for B. Dalton back when there was one. And then he worked for Barnes & Noble forever. And the way he would put your books in the hands of other people, and he would just buy 20 at a time or he would order a hundred at the time and say, this is what I'm doing for Christmas. I'm making sure everyone reads “Despereaux.” And not just because you were a Minnesota author but because he believed in it so much.
Kate DiCamillo:
That's what we call in the trade that's more than hand selling, but that's hand selling. That's the person that is on the floor of the bookstore. When the parent comes in and says, what book should I get? And they put it and that means I'm sitting here next to you because of hand selling, because of teachers, because of librarians.
Lori Walsh:
And who was it? I can't remember. They rather famously would ask kids if it was a librarian or did I read this in a book? Who said, what do you have in your pockets? If the kid didn't know what to read, she would say, what's in your pockets? And then when they showed them what was in their pockets—
Kate DiCamillo:
They would know what book they would—
Lori Walsh:
—know which book to put in their hands.
Kate DiCamillo:
Yeah, that's great.
Lori Walsh:
That's a librarian right there.
Kate DiCamillo:
That's great.
Lori Walsh:
That is a librarian. Well, we live in an era where the librarians are under and the teachers are under a lot of pressure. Book banning has taken a new energy in our state. Absolutely. In our community of Brookings recently, there were some book challenges and some bans and the community showed up at the school board to really stand against that and try to keep it from happening in their place.
Part of what you hear when there's a book banning, someone says, “Oh, well, there are books. We'll just sell more now.” But what I'm hearing you saying is libraries, schools, I mean, not everybody who wants your book has the money to buy your book or come across your book unless every student in the state of South Dakota was handed it as part of the Young Readers program.
How do you think about book banning in 2023?
Kate DiCamillo:
Every time and anytime I go out in public and talk about this, this comes up now. It is on everybody's mind. And the image that always flashes into my head is at the Smithsonian Portrait Gallery in D.C. there is a painting of Toni Morrison and has anybody stood in front of that? This is maybe three years ago, right before the pandemic. I was standing there looking at her and people that I didn't know, a young couple were standing next to me and the guy turned to me and said, “It looks like we're being told that we better do something right.”
And so, every time book banning comes up, I think about the fact that you can't get “The Bluest Eye” in a high school library in Florida. And I think about that portrait of Toni Morrison, and I think about that guy saying, we're being told to do something.
So, all I can say is that I know for a fact that I would not be here talking to you if a book saved my life, period, full stop. And so, to think about not being able to get a book that the eight-year-old me needed, it makes me feel panicky and terrified. So, it's all I know to do is to keep on pushing back and saying, it saves lives. It saves lives.
Lori Walsh:
Thank you to the librarians who were fighting that every day and the teachers as well. I know that it is not easy.
You mentioned “The Bluest Eye.” And a few years ago we had a candidate who's running for, I think for Congress in South Dakota, and I interviewed her and she mentioned that these books should not be in the school. And I said, well, I'd like you to give me an example. She had a very nasty story about what was in the content of these books. And she said, “The Bluest Eye,” and I just blanked on who wrote it. So, I took a quick break in radio, which we can't do today, so if we blank, you just get to watch it.
But I said, we'll be right back. And I quick Googled it, and I was like, oh. I came back and I said, you mean “The Bluest Eye” by Toni Morrison? And she said, I've never heard of him. So, how often is it that if you just pick up the book and read it and figure out who that author is and what that book is really about, the scary part goes away?
Kate DiCamillo:
And it's also that thing of, I don't know, do y'all ever listen to “The Moth?” On public radio? And sometimes when I'm listening to that, I think this is the only hope is for us to have a person who you think that you don't have anything in common with get up and tell you a personal story about their lives. And then you understand them.
And that's the same thing the book does. I always say, a story helps me to see myself. It helps me to see somebody else, and it helps me to see that there aren't that many differences, even though it might seem wildly different in the beginning. You're right. That takes away the fear once you read the book.
Lori Walsh:
I think there is a lot in your book that I think it might be popular today to call it re-parenting, but I sort of call it the anti-gas-lighting moments. I think in “The Tale of Despereaux,” Mig says something, and she's not understood. The line is, “It's a terrible thing to not be understood.” I think the first time I read that I was like, yes. Finally, somebody recognizes that when you're a kid and you're trying to say something and nobody's listening and they don't understand you, that it is a terrible thing to not be understood.
Kate DiCamillo:
It is, and it's terrifying. And it makes me think about, I get asked all the time, “Why are mice so important in children's books?” And it's just like, are you kidding? Because that's what it feels like to be a kid, right? You're pushed to the side. Or take, do y'all know Edward Tulane, and you think about that thing where you can't move and you can't speak? And it feels that way sometimes too.
Lori Walsh:
Or Miggery is told what you want is not, nobody cares what you want. What you want is not going to, well, that's not being considered here. Or Despereaux is the great disappointment to his mother at the moment of his birth. He is a disappointment. And aren't we all afraid of that?
Kate DiCamillo:
Right. Such a disappointment. Yeah.
Lori Walsh:
Don't we all need our parents or our teachers or our adults to say to us, you're not a disappointment because we're afraid of it all the time.
Kate DiCamillo:
Yep. I Am. Yeah.
Lori Walsh:
I want to talk about fairy tales, and I particularly want to bring attention to this forthcoming book called “The Puppets of Spelhorst.” Which I am just so delighted to have in my hand and had it shipped to my door so I could read it and fall in love with it already.
Kate DiCamillo:
That's so nice of you to say.
Lori Walsh:
Just wait. Just wait until you get this. And it's a Norendy Tale, which means there's going to be more. Right?
Kate DiCamillo:
Right, not with these puppets, but somewhere in the land of Norendy. Yeah.
Lori Walsh:
You heard it here first.
Kate DiCamillo:
Well, I made it up, so you can say it any way you want. I was like, it's just.
Lori Walsh:
I'll be correcting people.
Kate DiCamillo:
No one from Norendy is going to say, “Wait a minute?” Yeah.
Lori Walsh:
You don't understand. I'll be correcting people forever. They'll be like, it's a Norendy Tale. I'll be like, no. Kate told me that it was Norendy in Deadwood. But she also said, you can say whatever you want.
Well, that's interesting because in the beginning I was going to ask you, it starts with the sea captain who is finding these puppets on display and purchases them. I wanted to know why you started with the sea captain, and that might be the answer there. That this is not just a series about the puppets, that there are humans who are interacting with them, and we'll see that throughout this book.
Tell me a little bit about Norendy.
Kate DiCamillo:
Well, I don't know what I can tell you about Norendy, but let's do the sea captain.
Lori Walsh:
Yeah, perfect.
Kate DiCamillo:
And let's do how I write without knowing what I'm doing. Let's really pause on that for a while. So, when you say, why a sea captain? I've spent the last couple days talking to students, which has been fantastic, and talking to them about what to do if they want to be a writer.
And one of the things that I always say is keep a notebook. And what goes in the notebook? For me, the notebook exists to remind me to keep everything open all the time, my eyes, my ears, my brain, my heart. And it's also an excellent vehicle for eavesdropping and anything that I see that I think might turn into a story, I will put in that book.
And I was over at a friend's house and in her workroom, she's an artist, she had an owl puppet and also a wolf puppet. And I'm like, “Ooh, can I borrow those puppets?” I looked at them and I could tell there was a story, and so I've had them now for four years. This is how long it takes to write, and I put them in my office and I just waited. I had them at the back of the notebook, too, the wolf, the owl. So these puppets in here, it's actually a wolf, an owl, a boy, a girl and a king. And so, eventually I got the first line of the story once. What is the, once there was.
Lori Walsh:
Once there was a sea captain?
Kate DiCamillo:
No, once there was a wolf, I think. Once, no, very, oh, right here,
Lori Walsh:
I'm starting at act one.
Kate DiCamillo:
Yeah, right there. Once there was a king and a wolf and a girl. Here, I'll just read it to you. Just read that. Yes.
“Once there was a king and a wolf and a girl with a shepherd's crook and a boy with an arrow and a bow. And also there was an owl. The king had a beard made of human hair. The wolf's teeth were bared in a snarl. The girl wore a green cloak. The arrows and the boys' quiver were sharp enough to prick a finger. As for the owl, his feathers were real.
The king and the wolf and the girl and the boy and the owl lay jumbled together at the bottom of a trunk that had the word Spelhorst stenciled in gold letters on its lid and sides. The king and the wolf and the girl and the boy and the owl were puppets, and they were waiting for a story to begin.”
And so as soon as I had that, then I had the voice of it. And so, then I was off and running and I had that word Spelhorst. That was a word that had been transferred from notebook to notebook to notebook. And it's like, oh, it belongs with a puppets. Okay, then what does it mean? What does Spelhorst mean?
And finally, I answer your question, where did the sea captain come from? That's where he came from. From the fact that I knew the word Spelhorst was in it. And I figured out once I got that beginning that it was stenciled on the side of a trunk who the trunk belonged to. Then somebody named Spelhorst the sea captain.
Lori Walsh:
Fantastic, fantastic. You want to applaud? It's okay.
Kate DiCamillo:
No, there's nothing to applaud. It would be great. We were talking last night in this room about whether I outline or whether I just fly by the seat of my pants and I fly by the seat of my pants and it's terrifying. So yeah.
Lori Walsh:
Okay. But you have said famously, it's not about you, pumpkin.
Kate DiCamillo:
Right.
Lori Walsh:
Someone told you that. And part of it is what gets me so excited and I think what gets people is to where they want to applaud when they just hear you start telling the story and read it. All of a sudden we're all into that story is that you can immediately tap into. At least by the time it gets to us, you are immediately tapping into two pages, the universe of fairy tales, an oral history, tradition, everything that we know about life to be true. And it's all.
Kate DiCamillo:
You're terrifying me. Yeah.
Lori Walsh:
We're there because we're bringing ourselves to the book as well as readers. We show up and it's not just Kate. It's not just this beautiful illustration.
Kate DiCamillo:
It has nothing to do with Kate. Really.
Lori Walsh:
It is now about everything that I know about fairy tales and my own childhood and my own sea captain and “Jenny Linsky,” which is one of my favorite book series. I'm bringing him into it in my mind, and I'm wondering how they're the same or they're different, and we're all part of it with you.
Kate DiCamillo:
Yeah, isn't that great? That's the magic. Is like we all, it's like we form this community whether I'm sitting in Deadwood and looking at y'all, but if you never see me, never talk to me. We're there together in the book. Yeah.
[BREAK]
Lori Walsh:
We are spending time this hour in an intimate conversation with author, Kate DiCamillo. She is one of America's most successful and remarkable children's authors. Her award-winning books include “Because of Winn-Dixie,” “The Miraculous Journey of Edward Tulane” and “The Tale of Despereaux.”
Her latest book is called “The Puppets of Spelhorst.” I sat down with her at the South Dakota Festival of Books in Deadwood. The room was also packed with teachers and librarians and readers of all ages. We talk about fairy tales a little bit and the importance of fairy tales in your life and as a reader and just as a human being because they're just so essential to me. This is my favorite thing to talk about.
Kate DiCamillo:
I love Hans Christian Andersen, and that's what I go back and read and reread for myself, and also always trying to figure out how he did it.
Maurice Sendak illustrated “The Juniper Tree.” Do you all know that?
Lori Walsh:
Absolutely.
Kate DiCamillo:
Blows your socks off.
Lori Walsh:
Randall... I can't think of it.
Kate DiCamillo:
Yeah. Randall, I think it's Randall Jarrell, I think.
Lori Walsh:
Jarrell.
Kate DiCamillo:
Yeah, I don't know. I'm not sure. But Grimms' Fairy Tales illustrated by him, and it's spectacular.
So, I was a kid who, yes, got read to by my mother. And my father made up fairy tales, so that was a gift that he gave me. I was steeped in fairy tales, my father also.
So, I have this wolf and this owl that I took from Carla and still haven't given back. And I'm like, now I need them because I'm going to take them. I'll give them back soon. But my dad arrived once with a bunch of puppets and a puppet stage theater. And there was a king in there, so I didn't even think of that until I was halfway through this, so I'm tapping into that. In the neighborhood, we would put on puppet shows.
Lori Walsh:
Right. At one point, there are two children in this book. And they're going into the woods as part of the plot, and they say, "Oh, we're in ... There's a deep mystery here. We're like Hansel and Gretel, only we're us." Hansel and Gretel is my favorite fairy tale. And if you read “The Juniper Tree,” the version in “The Juniper Tree” is my favorite version of Hansel and Gretel. And I thought, "Of course, Kate would mention Hansel and Gretel."
So, do you have a favorite fairy tale? That's a Grimm, that's not Hans Christian Andersen.
Kate DiCamillo:
Yeah, that's a Grimm. And I love the Grimms even though they terrified me, too. And we had a record of fairy tales. And “The Juniper Tree” itself—
Lori Walsh:
It's dark, yeah.
Kate DiCamillo:
That is a terrifying story. Yeah. And you listen to somebody read that on a record and you think, "Oh, no." So, I do love the Grimm fairy tales, but I'm more of a Hans Christian Andersen kind of in sensibility.
And I love “The Steadfast Tin Soldier.” Yeah. So do you all know that one? It's heartbreaking and beautiful. And I think it was Adam Gopnik in The New Yorker wrote a while ago, somebody in The New Yorker wrote about how there would be no “Toy Story” without Hans Christian Andersen, that kind of inanimate object that's really animate.
Lori Walsh:
Do you have a favorite collection of Hans Christian Andersen in your library?
Kate DiCamillo:
It is, I can't remember who the translator is, but it's a beautiful Penguin book with French flaps, a reissued paperback. Yeah.
Lori Walsh:
Nice. So, you mentioned the darkness of a fairy tale, and there's darkness in all of our lives, and then there's darkness in your books as well. But there is this light. There's darkness in the world, we must value the light or go toward the light. So, let's not talk about darkness, let's talk about light.
Kate DiCamillo:
Let's not.
Lori Walsh:
And wonder, and also, what fairy tales give us.
Kate DiCamillo:
They give us a way through the woods. And they also, I think maybe it was Walter Benjamin, but I can't remember who said this about the fairy tale teaches us that we can meet our fate with high spirits and cunning. And so it shows you that there's a way through.
You know?
Lori Walsh:
Also, the power of, the binding power of words. And in this, there's one of my favorite, I have triple dog-eared this page, sorry.
Kate DiCamillo:
Oh, yeah, I can't wait to see which one it is. Raise your hand if you dog-ear. Raise your hand if you underline. Yeah. Raise your hand if you reread and so you date your underlinings because you watch yourself grow up in the book. You know?
Lori Walsh:
If you don't do that yet, do that now.
This is the king is on the mantle, he's a puppet, and the puppets are being taken down one by one. And I won't tell you why because you just have to read the book. And it says, "On the mantle, His majesty, the king, had given some thought to his circumstances and had grown quite agitated. ‘How can they be taken away, one by one? It does not seem right to me. I command someone to make it different.’ ‘What kind of different do you want it to be?’ said the girl. ‘I want it to be a world where songs are sung every day. I want us to be together. I command the world to be different.’ And the girl says, ‘Emma is writing a story with all of us in it. We will be together again."
And that is what I would send to my brother. I would say, "I command the world to be different." And if you're a child, that makes so much sense, and if you're an adult.
Kate DiCamillo:
Yeah. Our hearts still sing that. You know?
Lori Walsh:
Our hearts still sing that, when you say that, I don't want them to be taken away one by one.
Kate DiCamillo:
Yeah.
Lori Walsh:
I command it to be different.
Kate DiCamillo:
I command it to be different, yeah.
Lori Walsh:
And then there's also the binding power of words. The command doesn't work, but the curse, the blessing in fairy tales, that's a different kind of use of words.
Kate DiCamillo:
Yeah.
Lori Walsh:
Is the blessing.
Kate DiCamillo:
The blessing.
Lori Walsh:
About wonder and light.
Kate DiCamillo:
Yeah. Thanks for making me cry. I thought we were going to talk about happy things.
Lori Walsh:
We are.
Kate DiCamillo:
That's what you said.
Lori Walsh:
We are because the wolf has very sharp teeth.
Kate DiCamillo:
That's all the wolf ever talks about. She keeps on saying, "My teeth are well and truly sharp." Yeah.
Lori Walsh:
Everybody's a little tired of hearing about the wolf being that sort of thing. What does it mean when here in South Dakota, I'm sure we're not the only state, but I'm obviously biased to think that we've done it really well, okay, better, than many other states with every child.
Kate DiCamillo:
That is so astonishing.
Lori Walsh:
Is it third grade or fourth grade?
Kate DiCamillo:
Third grade.
Lori Walsh:
Third grade.
Kate DiCamillo:
Third grade.
Lori Walsh:
Every single third-grader in the state of South Dakota had this book. And I'm not saying they all read every page, but it was discussed in their classroom. It was part of their library. It was part of their lives.
Kate DiCamillo:
They got to take the book home.
Lori Walsh:
They got to take the book home and keep it.
Kate DiCamillo:
You got to own a book. That's what South Dakota did. Yeah, that is amazing. Yeah. That is amazing. And for me to get to be a part of that is just, it's unbelievable.
Lori Walsh:
They all grow up with this. And again, if you made those notes, you're going to come back and read that when you're in sixth grade maybe, or when you're an adult, you have your own children. And now you're going to read it out loud to them as an adult, or your own nieces or nephews, or you're going to volunteer at a school and you're going to read it aloud to someone.
What happens when we read aloud? And we talked about it a little bit already, but let's say more about for in the classroom and in the library, and for the parents who are sitting next to their children tucked in their arms, taking the time to put your phone down and stop worrying about what's for dinner, and just read.
Kate DiCamillo:
Yeah. And I've never been able to come up with the language for the magic that happens, but as a parent, you know it. As a teacher, you know it. As a librarian, you know it.
There's something extraordinary about reading aloud. It's a gift to the person who's reading and it's a gift to the person who's listening. And something subterranean happens. And we connect, it's like a third space. It's just like everybody kind of just puts their burdens down and you enter into this safe third space. And when we were in Rapid City the first night, I can't keep track of the days, but we did a public event. And there was a teacher in there that talked about how she had a student that something terrible had happened to, and another teacher had said, "What are you going to do when he comes back to school?"
And she said, "I'm going to read to him."
So, obliquely, you talk about these big things, and that's what story lets us do, talk about things that we don't have any language for, kids don't have any language for, and guess what, adults don't have any language for it either. But story gives us a way to talk about it. And when it's read out loud, the power of that is magnified a thousand fold.
Lori Walsh:
Yeah. Let's talk about snow.
Kate DiCamillo:
I love snow, yeah.
Lori Walsh:
Because your journey from Florida to Minnesota, and one of the reasons that you stay here, I saw on a recent interview, is because you really like snow. And one of my favorite things about this festival is that I buy all these books and then I go home and I'm like it can snow now because it's finally time, and I'm just ready for the seasons to change. I have my plan for the rest of the year, and what I'm going to read, and it's going to snow.
And you wrote my favorite poem of all time, and most people don't think of you as a poet, but it's called “Snow, Aldo.” And it's in a book called “Thanks & Giving” by Marlo Thomas. I think Harry Bliss, my friend and yours, illustrated it. And it is just a magical tribute to snow.
So, I thought I would ask you to talk a little bit about. We had such a tough winter last year, but it's okay.
Kate DiCamillo:
It is okay. I fell quite a bit. That's interesting. It was actually, I fell right before I was going. How many kids or adults saw the video that I did before coming here? And we were going to film that, and I fell on my face, and I said to the publicist, "I think that maybe we need to wait. I look pretty scraped up." And she said, "Oh, it will be fine by Friday." And then I sent her a picture of my face and she said, "Right. We'll reschedule."
So, but for me, coming from Florida, which is where I grew up, and moving to Minnesota and not in any way being prepared for it, I mean, I remember the first time it was five below and I stood at the window and kind of wept and said, "What do I do?" And my roommate said, "You layer up, and you step outside. That's what you do."
But I have really come to love the cold weather. I've really come to love the snow. And part of it is just what you said. Now you have all your books. Now it can snow. It is great for writing. And it still seems magical to me.
Lori Walsh:
You were, as a child, like me actually, I had croup is what they called. Maybe they still call it that. And they put me in a little tent.
Kate DiCamillo:
The oxygen tent, yeah.
Lori Walsh:
And sent me to the hospital, there's no visitation, so if you were in the hospital when we were kids, your mom and dad couldn't come there but two hours a day. And then the rest of the time, it was no visitation.
Kate DiCamillo:
Yeah, you're alone. Yeah.
Lori Walsh:
And I know this because in my scrapbook, my dad collected the hospital guide and the rules for parents, and this picture of me in the tent at the hospital. It was the most pathetic sight, weepy face. We can tell that child has been totally abandoned. Finally, my dad got tired of taking us to the hospital. We didn't have health insurance, for one thing, but also because they had to leave their child. And he took some bunk beds, and he taped, or stapled, or nailed, whatever, he was a handy guy. And he put plastic all around it, and they put a humidifier in there, and that's where I lived.
Kate DiCamillo:
Wow.
Lori Walsh:
I was in that little space, and they had a leaf from the table that they would slide in, and that's where my food would be because I couldn't leave because I couldn't breathe. And I spent weeks in the croup tent.
Kate DiCamillo:
And they slid books in there too, I'm guessing.
Lori Walsh:
And they slid books in it. Well, my older brother was the one who would read to me, and it was “James and the Giant Peach” or “The Last of the Really Great Whangdoodles.” And he would be the one who would read to me.
You also had chronic pneumonia. And that's what has your mother move you to Florida. Your father doesn't come. But do you look back at the time when you were sick in the way that I do, in the sense that I kind of miss that little tent.
In fact, if I'm really having a bad week, I'll just go home and turn the humidifier on really high and shut all the doors, and just sit in there and say I can't go anywhere because that's it. I've had enough. How do you view your time?
Kate DiCamillo:
No, I do not miss it, I have to say no. And I was just so terrified. I was so terrified. I was afraid of the nurses. I was just saying this to a friend the other day. I remember I grew up. We didn't have a TV until I was in fourth grade. And I remember being in the hospital, and they gave me Kool-Aid. That's something else no one would ever have offered me at home. And it's like, "Oh, boy." And I was allowed to come out to the nurses' station and sit on this little green couch, and I was going to get to watch Captain Kangaroo, and I was out of my mind with joy. And then I spilled the Kool-Aid on the couch, and so I was sent back to my room. And I'm still like, "I'm in trouble with the nurses. I disappointed the nurses." So, I was just so afraid all the time that there wasn't a lot of comfort in it.
However, when we're talking about that, the first time that I came to South Dakota and did that big thing in Sioux Falls with 900 kids. It was so interesting because that group of kids, every audience has its own personality, and those kids, as I stood up there and talked about being sick and talked about my father not being part of the family, they made the connection explicitly in the question-and-answer session afterwards.
These bad things that happened to you actually gave you something, and you would not be a writer if not. They were able to do that. And so, I think about those hard things.
And it's probably true for you, you would not be doing what you're doing if you weren't in the bunk bed oxygen tent. You know? Yeah. It gave you something. And it takes a long time to see that in life. And it's amazing when a young kid can make that connection. These things that hurt you actually give you something.
Lori Walsh:
Give you something, yeah. “Because of Winn-Dixie,” I don't know that it would've hit as big as it did if it didn't have that homesickness in it. Obviously, it's about a dog. And it's so smart, and it's so funny, and it's so loving, but it is also about loss. And you wrote it when you were deeply homesick, and I think that's one of the things. Something changed with Winn-Dixie. There was all kinds of wonderful children's literature, and I don't mean to imply that you invented something new.
Kate DiCamillo:
No, I didn't. No.
Lori Walsh:
But what hit in that book in that particular year was what was needed in children's literature. That's my opinion.
Kate DiCamillo:
That was the most astonishing thing. You have to understand that I was somebody who worked in a book warehouse, a book distributor, so no one could've had a better idea for what was going to happen to a first-time novel for middle grade. We served the whole Upper Midwest in that book distributorship. And a new Lois Lowry, Katherine Paterson, we would get 24 hardcover copies. And so I thought if I was really, really lucky, that 5,000 copies of Winn-Dixie would get sold, and that would be enough for me then to earn out my advance, and then they would let me do another one.
So, what happened with Winn-Dixie, I still haven't gotten my head around because it was this thing where it just got passed from hand to hand. And it changed my life. You know?
Lori Walsh:
Yeah. What are you working on next? How many things are you working on at the same time?
Kate DiCamillo:
To say that I'm working on them at the same time is kind of erroneous. I'm working on even shorter fairy tales now. And so I'll do a draft, I'll put it aside. I'll go and work on another one, another story that's in the first draft, second draft state. So, I rewrite so much so that I can always have something on that loom. Does that make sense?
Lori Walsh:
Yeah.
Kate DiCamillo:
I work on them.
Lori Walsh:
Does that keep you from stopping? Does it keep you from overthinking it? Because you said something earlier that I want to bring back to.
And I will ask for some questions here in the last 10 minutes. So, if you have a question you would like to ask Kate DiCamillo, think about it, and get it ready. We're almost to that point.
But you said something about just being always open and always your eyes are open, your ears are open. And that's kind of like walking around the world without skin to protect you in some ways. And so I wanted to ask you, does that hurt to go into the world that open all the time, and to receive and have your notebook? Is the notebook the protector of that?
Kate DiCamillo:
Yeah. No, I know what you're getting at. It's a really interesting question. Yeah.
The notebook protects it, but the notebook is also a reminder to stay open. And it's also that thing, the alchemy of being able to get away from myself by telling the story. So, it's like the story protects me. You have to be open to receive it, but to get to tell the story gets me away from myself, connects me to something deeper and smarter than I am. And so there's a safety in that. And I remember Katherine Paterson saying there's no way to do this except put the armor on, take the armor off, put the armor on, take the armor off. You've got to have the hide of a rhinoceros, and you've also got to have your heart absolutely exposed, on, off, on, off. You know? Yeah.
Lori Walsh:
So, if there's a child who comes to you and says I am writing, and it's really hard because I'm emotional all the time. Is there a way to? Because in the 10 years when you weren't writing, but you were saying that you were a writer, there's a sort of famous story about wearing a black turtleneck and saying, "I'm a writer," but not actually doing it.
Kate DiCamillo:
Yes, that's exactly right.
Lori Walsh:
I like to think you were preparing. Stuff was happening in your head even though you weren't writing.
Kate DiCamillo:
Maybe.
Lori Walsh:
But for the youngest writers who want to do this, how do you enter into it in a way that is healthy?
Kate DiCamillo:
That's a really good way to phrase it.
So, the first way to enter into it healthily is, and I got this message early on but I just ignored it, is writing is not about making yourself seen. It's not about you, pumpkin. It's about entering this stream of stories and putting yourself aside.
So, you don't do it to make somebody look at you, you do it to look at the world. And that's the physical embodiment of that for me, is the notebook, and that's why I talk so much about it to adults and kids. That's what it's a reminder of. And then the rest of it is just this thing, and I talked about this last night too, where there's no right or wrong way to do this. The only wrong way to do it is if you want to write and you're not doing it. That's the only wrong way.
But after that, all bets are off. There's no way to find your way through telling a story, you teach yourself how to do it. Other people can listen. Other people can offer suggestions. But it is ultimately this very personal journey, and you're going to do it your way.
I've talked a lot about the thing that works for me is to do two pages a day. That is not a prescription. That is just the thing that works for me. You know?
Lori Walsh:
Yeah. I think that is beautiful. Thank you for that.
