IWACA GUEST INTERVIEW
GETTING TO KNOW
THE AUTHOR
Michael Anderson
IWACA | 15
I
t is with great pleasure that I introduce to you, Michael
Anderson, IWACA's first guest interview.
What inspired you to write PROVOKE NOT THE CHILDREN?
When I'm not writing, I work as an attorney at a large law firm in Washington, DC. My office used to be located in Georgetown, which is an upper-class section of the city. One day, mid-afternoon, as I was working at my desk, I heard dozens of very young voices talking loudly outside. I looked out the window and saw 20 toddlers, two to three years old at most, walking in two lines side-by-side. On the inside, they were holding hands with the child in the other line. On the outside they were holding a rope that was surrounding the whole group. There was one adult pulling them from the front and two adults following up in the back. I thought to myself, "That's cute," and watched as they disappeared further into Georgetown.
About 45 minutes later, I heard the
same group outside again, this time returning from their trip. I looked out the window again. But this time a thought struck me. This isn't so much cute as it is sad. This picture represented the childhood of many kids in the large U.S. urban centers. They are dropped off at the pre-daycare at 6 or 7 am. I live next to one in Virginia and see the kids come and go. The pre-daycare drops these kids off at the daycare at 8. They stay there until 5. At 5, the parents scramble to move them from daycare to after-care (if they are late, they can be fined $25 or more in the Washington, DC area) where the kids stay until 7 or 8 pm. The parents get off work and pick the kids up, take them home, feed them, put them in front of the TV and then send them to bed. Repeat. Repeat. Repeat.
So is there a message in your novel for the readers?
Shifts in societal pressures and