I don't often admit to being stirred by a piece of writing, but at the end of the story "Rowing To Eden," in Amy Bloom's collection of stories A Blind Man Can See How Much I Love You ( Vintage, New York, NY, 2000/1, $14 ) , I was moved to tears. In the story, wife and husband Mai and Charley are finding ways to cope with Mai's recent mastectomy. Mai's close friend Ellie, who has had a mastectomy herself, provides an unexpected outlet for Charley, bringing him closer to understanding his wife's illness. In fact, almost all of the stories ( eight total ) in this remarkable collection, as well as the characters that populate them, can be called unexpected. From the supportive mother who is with her daughter as she goes through gender reassignment, to a widow's candid observations about the yuppification of her neighborhood, to the mother coming to terms with the death of her newborn...you've never met such people. These characters rise off the page and sit next to the reader, as real as can be.
Gregg Shapiro: You have written three books...two books of short fiction and one novel. Do you have a preference for one genre over the other?
Amy Bloom: No. Obviously I've written a lot more short stories than I have novels, and that will always be true. I like them both. I actually don't find them that different. With the short stories, there is no room for rambling and digressions or little riffs on this or that. There is only room for what counts.
GS: The beautifully and sensitively written title story of the collection, A Blind Man Can See How Much I Love You, is another example of the recent flurry of writing about the transgendered community. Can you please comment on that?
AB: I had done a nonfiction piece for the New Yorker several years ago on female-to-male transsexuals. I had been struck by a couple of the families that I had met and the sacrifices that the parents made to help their kids with the transsexual surgery. It had just stayed with me. I found myself thinking that I didn't have much of a sense of what it would be like to be transsexual, but I certainly have a sense of what it's like to be a mother and to support one's children, whether or not you really like what they're doing. I think that it's more that sense of how it is that good parents love their children.
GS: You have received a considerable amount of favorable attention from mainstream publications. Have you had the same experience with queer publications...such as the Lambda Book Report or The Advocate?
AB: I don't really know. I don't follow most of that stuff. Not just the queer publications...I don't read most of the mainstream ones either. I don't know that I'm the best person to ask. The Advocate did a big piece, which I know about because I spent a lot of time talking to Ann Stockwell, who was the reporter who did the piece on me. I don't know. Somebody else would have to do the research and tell, I think.
GS: The story "Stars At Elbow And Foot" effectively portrays a mother's grief at loss of her infant, and it made me think about the stories in the news about postpartum depression. Do you think that the voice of authority in the story came from your being a mother yourself or from observation?
AB: I think both. I think that there is a kind of rage concealed in the despair when you experience that kind of loss. I wanted to give the rage a voice.
GS: The subject of Judaism comes up in "The Gates Are Closing" and you are reading at Jewish Community Centers in Massachusetts and New Jersey. Can you please say something about the importance of connecting with that segment of your readership?
AB: This is a new experience for me, and I'm sure it is a direct result of that particular short story. The JCCs have this book festival in November and they tend to invite a lot of writers. I was happy to be invited and I'm happy to go. As far as that group of my readership is concerned, I'm happy for anybody who comes to a reading.
GS: I understand that you have taught writing workshops at the Fine Arts Work Center in Provincetown. What did you like best about that experience?
AB: The beach. Actually, it's a wonderful writing workshop. I think that it has a great staff. The faculty are wonderful. I go there and I meet different writers and poets for whom I have a great deal of respect. I also get to hang out with old friends.
GS: Will you be going back there to teach?
AB: I expect so.
GS: Have you begun working on your next book?
AB: I'm actually working on a nonfiction book, which I suspect will be my one and only nonfiction book. It's called Normal. The subheading is "Transsexual CEOs, Cross-Dressing Cops and Hermaphrodites With Attitude."
