Terabithia & beyond: A conversation with Katherine Paterson

What a marvelous year for Katherine Paterson.

The King College graduate and longtime children’s author enjoyed success long before this year. However, when Hollywood adapted her novel “Bridge to Tarabithia,” which was released on the big screen in February, a whole new appreciation came her way.

“I hear it made a whole lot more people read the book,” Paterson said by phone from her home in Barre, Vt.

Paterson will return to King College on Nov. 12. She will give the convocation for students and faculty early that day, and then later she will appear at King for the public at large to come and see, hear and appreciate.

“I’ll be reading from my work and talking back and forth with the audience,” Paterson said. “I thoroughly enjoy doing those as opposed to doing speeches.”



EARLY DAYS

Katherine Paterson was born on Oct. 31, 1932 in China. Her family soon moved to Japan, and then to America at the dawn of World War II. Her family eventually settled in Winchester, Va. and upon graduation of high school she enrolled in King College. “I had a wonderful experience at King,” Paterson said. “It was very tiny, just over 300 students then. I cherish the connection.”

However, do not look for references to King within her books. There aren’t any, and for a perfectly logical reason.

“I don’t write for college students,” Paterson said.

She married Presbyterian minister John Paterson in 1962. They subsequently had four children – two adopted and two by birth. Writing for publication came practically by chance.

“I started writing because the Presbyterian church asked me to write a book for fifth and sixth grade children,” Paterson said.

Well, when time permitted, that is.

“I had four tiny children and cherished what little time I had,” she said.

Lack of time notwithstanding the liter

ary bug bit Paterson hard. She developed a ‘Why not?’ motto of sorts to writing, and so she struck out to write her first novel. She needed such an attitude, given the brevity of time during which she could work.

“I was writing in five minute swatches of time,” Paterson said. “That’s how I wrote my first novel.”

She started her book for the church in 1964 and it was published in 1966.

“Then there was a seven year stretch between my books,” she said. “I’m not sorry about that in retrospect because I learned a lot, but it was hard at the time.”



WRITING

Hard is the word alright. Writing isn’t for those who prefer 9-to-5 schedules, lack self discipline and shun solitude.

“It fits a certain personality that likes to work alone,” Paterson said. “Writers cherish working alone and I really love it.”

She needs to. Put yourself in her shoes and imagine the long and sometimes brain-wracking hours of trying to find just the right words. Then consider what happens when a book is actually finished and ready for public consumption.

“People don’t understand that writing books doesn’t happen magically,” Paterson said. “It takes work. It takes guts. You are laying yourself out for the public. For me, every new book is a challenge. It’s always scary.”

And yet she happily forges forward. Writing fiction as Paterson most often does demands a high wattage imagination. Think about that. She actually creates worlds upon the pages of her books from which places and characters emerge near to lifelike as one’s imagination can summon.

“Sometimes a character walks in and it’s like, ‘who the heck are you?’ They come in different ways,” Paterson said. “Some characters walk in and they’re fully grown. It’s amazing. It’s like, ‘Oh, how do you do?’”

Such work sometimes comes from routine and sometimes from inspiration.

“You have to have a combination,” she said. “If you write from just inspiration you’ll never get a book done. You have to regard it as work. Some days are exciting and wonderful, but you still go to work even if they aren’t.”

However, as Paterson’s stature within the literary world has grown, her time available to spend writing has shrunk.

“People say ‘How long does it take to write a book?’ It used to take a year but that was before people knew me,” she said. “My last book took close to three years from start to finish.”



BRIDGE

Paterson’s “Bridge to Terabithia” stands perhaps as her pinnacle literary achievement. Published in 1977, the book won the internationally prestigious Newbery Medal in 1978.

Such books are not merely words bundled to form a book. They can profoundly change lives.

“It’s amazing, isn’t it?” she said.

Oh yes.

“I got a letter from a man who said he went to see “Bridge,” and he said, ‘Don’t ask me why I did. Nobody would believe that I would see it. But there was this little boy with such an imagination, and I was jealous of him. That used to be me,’” Paterson said, quoting the man’s letter.

The man added that he was currently deep into alcohol and drug use.

“‘But I will be that little boy again,’” Paterson said that he said. “I was so moved by that.”

Such letters from readers always touch her, she said.

“It makes me weep,” she said. “It’s something bigger than me.”



WRITING FOR CHILDREN

Children’s books are more accepted today by those within the literary world than perhaps at any other time. Visit a bookstore. Walk through what once was the children’s aisle and what has become the children’s section.

There’s at least one reasonable explanation.

“Thanks to J.K. Rowling (she of “Harry Potter” fame), all of a sudden, oh, you can make money writing books for children,” Paterson said.

Whatever, children’s books can be pivotal in developing lifelong readers.

“I would hope so,” Paterson said. “You don’t just suddenly become a reader of “Madame Bovary.” You have to learn to read and learn how important it is to read.”

Power resides within readers. What one reader may gather and learn from a book may be exactly opposite from another, and yet both were affected.

Take Paterson’s books. She wrote them, but ultimately the reader decides what they mean for themselves.

“The reader always gets to choose what it means to them,” Paterson said. “For me, the meaning of all my stories is grace. I would hope for my readers to experience grace when they read my stories, too.”

And to those who do not read?

“I’m not a nagger, but they are missing out on so much joy and so much wisdom,” Paterson said. “I feel sad for them. I feel sad for people who don’t look beyond their own lives.”

TOM NETHERLAND is a freelance writer. He can be reached at features@bristolnews.com.



IF YOU GO

Who: Katherine Paterson

When: Nov. 12, 7:45 p.m.

Where: King College, student center complex, King College Road, Bristol Tennessee

Tickets: Free

Info: (423) 652-4157

Web: www.terabithia.com

WANT TO KNOW MORE?  Katherine Patterson has penned a wide range of books. While "Bridge to Terabithia" stands as her most well known, the senior scribe has also written 15 novels, seven works of non-fiction, six picture story books, four chapter books, and two collections of Christmas short stories. Her latest novel, "Bread and Roses, Too," was issued in September 2006.

source: www.terabithia.com