Author interview - Donna Leon

R: Today I'm welcoming international crime writer Donna Leon to the Crime Warp - a first for us!   Hi Donna, welcome to the Crime Warp.  You’re here in the UK promoting your latest book “The Golden Egg”.  How is your tour progressing?

DL: The tour is fine - lots of enthusiastic readers, which is always nice to see.

R: Glad to hear it.   You had a high powered academic career as a literature lecturer and then professor.  What made you change from academia to writing crime fiction?  Was writing something you always wanted to do?

DL: No, I never planned to be a writer: I just liked reading fine prose and talking about it with other people who had read the same text.  Then I had a conversation about killing a conductor, and I thought it might be interesting to see if I could write a murder mystery.

R:  You’ve lived in Venice for more than a quarter of a century, but it doesn’t seem like a likely setting for crime novels.  Why did you choose Venice for your crime novels and why do you think it works so well?

DL: I think Venice works well because of the human impulse to associate virtue with beauty, or beauty with virtue.  Unfortunately, this isn't true: bad people can be physically lovely.  So there is the constant surprise in discovering that a city as beautiful as Venice can be just as seedy and corrupt in an ethical sense as the rest of the world.  I wrote about Venice because it was, then, the only place I'd lived for a long time as an adult.

R:  Do you think it’s essential for you to live in Venice to keep the sense of place and character of the city so clear and up to date?

DL: No, I don't think it's necessary to live there.  I've got the imprinting of the streets, speak the language, spend a good deal of time there.  But I now spend much of my time in Switzerland because my editor and publisher are there, and the orchestra with which I work is based there, as well.

R: Turning to your main character, What was the inspiration for Commissario Brunetti?

DL: I had no desire stronger than to write about a decent, intelligent man.  I knew I would be with him for as long as it took to write the book, so I wanted him to be someone I'd enjoying spending a good deal of time with.  And I have.

R: How important are the characters of Inspector Vianello and Signorina Elettra in bringing out Brunetti’s character?

DL: I think the rugged tenacity of Vianello is a great aid to Brunetti, who tends to be more speculative in his thinking.  And Signorina Elettra takes care of all the computer stuff i haven't a clue about.

R: A regular theme is Brunetti’s on-going conflict with Vice Questore Patta.  Do you think it’s important to have this kind of internal conflict for the overall plot to work?  Why have you cast Patta as a self serving buffoon, rather than an able adversary? 

DL: I'm always puzzled when people view Patta as a buffoon.  He's intelligent, crafty, knows how to play the system and win important friends.  He is puzzled and irritated with Brunetti, but he has the sense to leave him alone, not only because of his family connections but because he knows how good a cop he is.  He also, Patta, has a deep sense of loyalty to certain people, and I admire that in him.

R: Have you found that as you’ve got older that Brunetti has changed, and has he changed in the same way that you have?

DL: Yes, both of us are growing darker in our vision of the world, while both of us remain fairly happy people.  Go figure.

R: The Golden Egg is now the 22nd Brunetti novel.  How do you keep the character fresh, or are you starting to tire of Brunetti?

DL: No, there will always be something to write about, some new crime, some new dishonesty.  When this is no longer the case, then I'll stop writing, of course.  If I think it's dull, imagine the poor reader.

R: That’s certainly true, there’s always some new crime or dshonesty.  I wondered if that’s what’s driven the plotlines in your later novels, which follow many contemporary themes.  Your last book Beastly Things was about corruption in the meat industry – a most prophetic plotline!  Was this a fictional invention or did you know about the European horsemeat scandal before everyone else did?

DL: I knew about what is done in the raising of animals that are killed to be eaten.  The newspapers and magazines are filled with stories about how they are treated, about the things that injected into them, what they are dosed with.  Has everyone forgotten the hoof and mouth disease craze of some years ago?

R: Suffer little Children is also quite up to date in its theme of unethical medical practice and babies for sale.  What was it that made you choose this as the theme for that book?

DL: There was a similar case about ten years ago in Italy, of people buying a baby born to an illegal immigrant woman.  As I recall, the authorities allowed them to keep the kids for more than a year before stepping in to take it back.

R: I think these later books contrast with earlier Bruntti novels, which have more traditional or expected themes and plots – have you consciously moved away from these plot lines or have they just been exhausted?

DL: Very little of what happens here, in terms of what happens in the books or the subjects discussed, is done at the conscious level.  I find something that interests me and write about it.

R: Your latest book, The Golden Egg – I don’t want to give too much away, but why did you choose a mentally handicapped boy as the victim.  Does this represent something about the many anonymous and unnoticed people in our society that most people ignore despite professing to care deeply for their plight? 

DL: No, I was intrigued by the importance of language as a means of measuring our humanity or the extent to which we have full rationality.  I was also intrigued by how important language as a toy is important to the Brunetti family.

R: Brunetti has appeared on German TV for some time – I think it’s 18 episodes to date since starting in 2000.  Do you think we’ll see him on UK TV soon?

DL: I've been talking to the BBC for five years.  I spoke to them again yesterday.  The Italians say, "If they are roses, they will blossom."  I'm hoping for roses.

R:  Well, that sounds very hopeful.  Looking back, how hard did you find it to get your first Commissario Brunetti novel, Death a La Fenice, published?  Were publishers resistant to the idea of an Italian policeman and a novel set in Venice?

DL: It won an international prize, so there was little difficulty in finding a publisher

R: You chose to write the novels in English.  They’ve been translated into many other languages, but I understand not into Italian, at your request.  Why is this?

DL: I'd rather not be a celebrity where I live.  English is the only language I could have written them in.

R: You’ve published other books linked to Brunetti – a cookbook and a guide to Venice, as well as a book called “Venetian Curiosities”.  What is your motivation in writing these other books? 

DL: I was asked by my publisher to write the first two, but the bulk of both was written by other people; a travel writer and a cook.  The other, Venetian Curiosities, gives the orchestra a new forum in which to be heard playing Vivaldi.

R: Finally, are you working on any other projects at the moment, perhaps a new character or book?

DL: I'm working on another music project/book/CD with the orchestra, a book about the gondola, accompanied by a CD of 17th and 18th gondola songs.

R: Donna, thanks for making time to come on the Crime Warp and we wish you every success with your book tour.

Romancrimeblogger