Interview: Lily Iona MacKenzie
Lily Iona MacKenzie was born in Edmonton, raised in Calgary, and currently lives in the SF Bay Area. She has published reviews, interviews, short fiction, poetry, travel pieces, essays, and memoirs in over 150 American and Canadian venues. Her novel Fling! was published in July 2015 by Pen-L Publishing. Bone Songs, another novel, will be published in 2016. You can learn more about her at lilyionamackenzie.wordpress.com (adapted from Goodreads).
TCJWW: Like Feather in Fling!, you grew up in Canada. How much of your inspiration for the novel was autobiographical?
MacKenzie: Sometimes, I write from what I know toward what I don’t know, though I also have done the opposite, as in Bone Songs, my novel that will be published in 2016. There, I started with a character I knew NOTHING about. So while some aspects of Fling! have seeds in my history of growing up in Canada and family, those origins shift from autobiographical into art when I start writing. None of the characters are specifically modeled on people I know, but they may all be, at least partially, based on characteristics of people I have known. But these characteristics didn’t necessarily originate in people I knew in Canada.
TCJWW: You wrote in your bio, “magical realism pulses at the heart of [your] narratives.” What draws you to magical realism? Do you think that it captures a broader view of reality than realism can on its own?
MacKenzie: Reality is both magical and “real,” if by real we mean something that isn’t imagined. I’m not a philosopher, but this computer I’m typing on has a life distinct from mine. My husband, who is sitting reading in a chair across from me, can see it and agree on its reality. But it also exists in a world where objects can become symbols for something else, so while my computer retains its identity as a writer’s tool, it also can represent a window into another universe. It can become a metaphor for many things, just as most objects can. This, then, seems to be the foundation for what we call magical realism. Language by its very nature is magical, transforming our everyday reality in multiple ways, carrying us aloft on the wings of thought. When I call on magical realism in my fiction, I do it because it opens me up to a fuller understanding of our world, both internally and externally.
TCJWW: American culture is more youth-obsessed than ever so it’s refreshing to see a ninety-year-old woman like Bubbles in Fling! portrayed so vibrantly as a woman who still hungers for food, travel, sex, and the other finer things in life. How do you feel about the emphasis placed on youthfulness in American culture and what, in your opinion, should we learn to appreciate about aging?
MacKenzie: Since I turned 75 last month, I think a good deal about aging—my own particularly! While there are adjustments we must make at every stage of life, I feel that our later years make more demands on us. Of course, we can ignore our aging and pretend that the end game won’t be part of our future. But the reality is, it will. It forces us, some of us, to come to terms with what it means to be mortal. But I also believe that if we’re mentally and physically agile, we can also find ways to embrace our infirmities at the same time as we discover new ways to transcend them. I’m a great believer in the imagination and its ability to open new doors. We will face limitations as we grow older, but even within those boundaries there is room to maneuver. I hope that Bubbles shows the way for other novelists to feature more elderly characters, especially female!
TCJWW: You’ve written everything from reviews, travel pieces, essays, and memoir to short fiction, poetry, and Fling! being your first published novel. Do you have a favorite genre? What was writing your first novel like?
MacKenzie: Poetry is my favorite genre. It’s so satisfying to write a good poem that I don’t feel the need to publish it. Just the act of writing one fills me with joy. Fiction requires a much longer commitment, especially a novel. And you never know (at least I don’t) at the beginning just where you’ll end up. Fling! began with me wondering what had happened to my Scottish grandmother, who had left her kids and her husband in the 1920s and traveled to Mexico with her lover. I never knew this grandmother, but I was fascinated with her courage, especially in that era, to step out of the conventional woman’s role. Writing Fling! was my attempt to give her a voice.
TCJWW: Finally, I’m curious… Which character are you more similar to, Bubbles or Feather?
MacKenzie: I'm not either/or. Elements of both characters surface in me. Just ask my husband!
