Greenbelt Magazine Volume 7, No 1 | Page 46

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STORY MIKE TURNER | PHOTOS LETICIA HUEDA

The Writing Life

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lan Heathcock , world traveler , Whiting Award winner , fellowship lecturer , and Chicago native , calls Boise his home . His first book , Volt , earned praise for its portrayal of lives bent but not broken , by grim circumstances . It was named a “ Best Book ” in 2011 by the Chicago Tribune , Publishers Weekly , GQ Magazine , and others . In the years since winning the prestigious Whiting Award and fellowships at the Tin House and Bread Loaf Writers ’ Conferences , he ’ s taught in Spain , France , Switzerland , Italy , and Ireland , but he always returns to Boise , the city he ’ s called home for 16 years .
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Heathcock grew up in Chicago , and despite his affection for the city and its people , he admits , “ I wanted out . I was ready to be somewhere different , but I didn ’ t know where that would be .” A college friend , writer Anthony Doerr , had recently moved to Boise and suggested Heathcock come out west . “ It seemed like a good idea ,” Heathcock says . “ They had just started a new writing program at Boise State . I thought I ’ d just be out here a couple of years , but now it ’ s home and I completely love it here .”
Early Inspiration
Heathcock ’ s fiction takes an unflinching view of tragic circumstances , inspired early on by a need to make sense of his own world . During high school he lost a friend to suicide , and while struggling to make sense of the tragedy , his English teacher made a suggestion which changed Heathcock ’ s life and shaped his writing career . The suggestion was to read the short story “ Indian Camp ” by Ernest Hemingway . “ In that story , a boy and his father , who ’ s a doctor , take a boat to an island where a woman is in distress ,” Heathcock says . “ Her husband gets so bereaved that he kills himself . In the story , the boy asks his father if many men kill themselves , and they have this conversation . It ’ s one of those stories that , in a very powerful way , made me feel like I was not alone with these feelings . Finally , someone was saying something about it , but it was on the page .”
It wasn ’ t until years later that Heathcock realized he wanted to tell stories that would touch people in the same way . The inspiration came after a difficult day at work driving around Iowa in the summer heat and humidity , where he had just been cursed out by a customer who was having a bad day . His escape was to go to a local park and read short stories by Joy Williams , John Cheever , and Joyce Carol Oates . “ They were all intense stories that spoke to the frustration I had with the world ,” Heathcock says . “ I knew that with as powerful an experience as I had with these stories and the truth they told , that ’ s what I wanted to do . The next day I started researching MFA programs and planning my escape route out of the job world and into the writing world .”
The Writer ’ s Toolbox Empathy is an essential trait for a writer to possess , according to Heathcock . “ As an artist , your job is to inhabit the lives of people who are not you ,” he says . “ The premier trait of a fiction writer is that you have to be an empathetic human .”
Heathcock taught fiction writing for many years at Boise State University , where he refined his list of the necessary skills and
GREENBELT MAGAZINE | JAN - FEB 2017