“I had rather be a meteor, single, alone.' Plus Paris itself was noisome. Even with its glittering bridges and orangeries, even if the birthplace of ballet. 'I had rather been a meteor, than a star in a crowd.” IdentityAmbitionUniqueness Of IndividualSelf Creation Book:Margaret the First Source: Margaret the First
“Off come her skirts and petticoats, her lace cuffs and collar, her shoes and whalebone stay, until she lies on her side in nothing but a cotton shift and endless strands of pearls. Dust hangs in a crack of light between red velvet drapes, like stars. Her dreams are glimpses, bewildered--celestial charts, oceanic swells, massive, moving bodies of water, the heavens as heavenly liquid, familiar whirlpools, the universe as a ship lost at sea--but the ship she imagines arrived safely, years ago, loaded with their possessions.” DaydreamsWandering ThoughtsWhere Ideas Come From Book:Margaret the First Source: Margaret the First
“I'm not sure running the press has changed how I write (though perhaps it has in ways I can't see), but it has certainly changed my relationship to how books get made.” WayWritingMadeI CanBookRunningChangedPressesNot Sure Author:Danielle Dutton
“I can be a fairly hands-on editor, and when I'm editing someone I feel intensely invested in that writer and her work. I love helping to shape a book, and I feel very privileged to get to do that with writers I'm excited about. I think doing that work for the past six years has changed me, and it better prepared me for the questions and suggestions.” ThinkingFeelsYearsI CanBookHelpingHandsPastChangedShapesSixPreparedExcitedEditorsEditingPrivilegedSuggestions Author:Danielle Dutton
“It's interesting, editing can be so immersive for me that I've noticed that the authors I edit have a pretty profound effect on how I hear language for a while.” LanguageInterestingEffectsProfoundEditingEdits Author:Danielle Dutton
“I suppose also that watching marketing and publicity stuff play out from behind the scenes, making those plans and seeing each piece fall into place or not, each year, for each book, has made me a little more tranquil about the process for my own book than I might otherwise be.” YearsLittlesMadeBookPlayMightFallStuffProcessMy OwnBehindsPiecesPlansSeeingSceneMarketingPublicityTranquilBehind The ScenesFall Into Place Author:Danielle Dutton
“It's so exciting when a book catches traction you didn't even expect (or completely did expect!), and so frustrating when a book never quite catches the traction you know it deserves. But either way it doesn't change the book, it doesn't change how much I love that book, or how thrilled I am to be publishing it.” KnowsWayBookDeserveExcitingPublishingFrustratingNever QuitTraction Author:Danielle Dutton
“As a publisher what you are trying to build is a long life for a book, to help it find its readers in many different ways, whether or not it made this list or got that review, etc. I'm sure some of that thinking has been useful to me as a writer as well.” ThinkingWayTryingWellsLongHas BeensMadeBookDifferentHelpingReaderListsDifferent WaysEtcReviewsPublishersLong Life Author:Danielle Dutton
“Margaret Cavendish was one of the people who came up in the course. That was when I started thinking about her as a character for a book, but my idea was for a totally different book. It had all these characters in it; Samuel Pepys was one of the main characters. He famously wrote these extensive diaries through the period that are really funny and sort of saucy, actually.” PeopleThinkingBookIdeasDifferentCharacterCoursesPeriodsDiariesMain CharactersDifferent BooksThinking About Her Author:Danielle Dutton
“So it was this multi-perspective, multi-character book, and it went through all of these different manifestations. I'm not sure there was a single moment where I thought to myself, Oh, I need to write about Margaret Cavendish. She just kept taking over the book I thought I was writing.” NeedsWritingBookDifferentMomentsCharacterPerspectiveManifestationNot SureSingle Mom Author:Danielle Dutton
“I would be researching seventeenth-century garden design or I would be doing something with Pepys, but I just kept using all of it to write about Margaret Cavendish. It took me a long time to realize that I just wanted to write a book about her. Years.” WritingYearsLongBookWould BeWantedRealizingCenturyDesignLong TimeGardenGarden Design Author:Danielle Dutton
“Finding the form was really a very dynamic process. I went through a lot of shifting, trying to get it right. Because the writing took place over such a long time, it's hard for me to pinpoint when specific things happened, but basically the final version only materialized in the last two or so years. It was there, but it took me a while to see it and then to refine it after I'd seen it.” WritingTryingYearsLongTwoHardLastsFormProcessHappenedFindingsLong TimeFinalsThings HappenVersionsShifting Author:Danielle Dutton
“I sense people expect something to show for ten years. But I do feel like it is dense. Some of my own favorite books are slim, but there's a lot of weight and power in them.” PeopleFeelsYearsBookShowsMy OwnTenWeightDenseSlimFavorite Book Author:Danielle Dutton
“Back then, when I had that original idea to write about the seventeenth century, the whole thing was set in 1666. I was thinking of Margaret near the end of her life, and that was the voice I heard for her.” ThinkingWritingIdeasEndsWholeVoiceHeardCenturyOriginalsOriginal Ideas Author:Danielle Dutton
“But when I realized it was actually going to be this portrait of the artist, birth to death, I had to then discover who Margaret as a young woman would be. I had to find the different voices for her throughout her life. I had a lot of fun discovering that. I had a lot of fun writing the childhood sections. By imagining her childhood, I was able to come up with this voice that matures as she gets older.” WritingDifferentWould BeAbleYoungArtistFunVoiceChildhoodBirthCome UpI RealizedDiscoveringYoung WomenPortraitsSectionsDifferent Voices Author:Danielle Dutton
“The reason the middle section switches to third person is, well, this is middle age. This is the part in her life where she loses track of something that was driving her and has to figure out what's going to drive the next part of her mission, this mission to be an author. I had to push back away from her for a while before we could come up to that really lyrical close third in the final section.” WellsPersonsReasonAgeNextLosesMiddleFiguresThirdsFinalsTrackCome UpMissionsDrivingSectionsMiddle AgesLyricalThird Person Author:Danielle Dutton
“The way I've talked about my research process is that it was like magpies. I was just sort of moving through all these books and when something shiny would pop out I'd be like, Ooh, I love it! and I'd pluck it out. It's fun to figure out how to use those bits you really love - like I'd read about gold shoes with cork heels. Obviously, Margaret would have to wear those shoes.” WayBookUseMovingFunBitsProcessFiguresResearchGoldShoesPopsHeelsPluckCorkMagpiesGold Shoes Author:Danielle Dutton
“I had all these sparkles I'd collected and wanted to work in, but when I originally started writing it and it was originally this novel about all these people set in 1666, what I was so interested in was the New Science.” PeopleWritingWantedNovelSparkle Author:Danielle Dutton
“I was obsessed with the scientific instruments people were building and all the weird experiments they were doing. I did actually wind up working in some of that, but there were whole sections I'd written about these instruments that ultimately had to be abandoned when I realized that the book really was about Margaret Cavendish. I couldn't justify using all of them.” PeopleBookWholeWrittenBuildingWindInstrumentsI RealizedExperimentsObsessedJustifyAbandonedSections Author:Danielle Dutton
“I was sad to see some of them go. Like a magic lantern that would project images on walls and people would travel the countryside with these magic lanterns and tell stories. And there was this cabinet that you would walk up to and it had a little peephole and inside the whole thing was covered in thousands of little mirrors.” PeopleLittlesWholeStoriesWalksMagicWallProjectsMirrorsCoveredCabinetsCountrysideLanternsPeepholes Author:Danielle Dutton
“There was a stage inside it and a crank on the outside that would rotate something, like a tiny tree carved of cork, onto the stage, and then the thousands of little mirrors would multiply that one tree so that the viewer would see an infinite forest instead.” LittlesTreeStageInfiniteMirrorsTinyForestsViewersCrankCork Author:Danielle Dutton
“I was trying to focus on Margaret's trajectory as an artist, as a woman and an artist. Hopefully Cavendish experts won't be angry at me for anything I've left out. I feel like all the major movements of her life are there.” FeelsTryingArtistLeftFocusMovementMajorsAngryHopefullyExpertsLeft OutTrajectory Author:Danielle Dutton
“I'm not entirely sure what a historical novel absolutely has to be, but you don't want a reader who loves a very traditional historical novel to go in with the expectation that this is going to deliver the same kind of reading experience. I think what's contemporary about my book has something to do with how condensed things are.” ThinkingWantKindBookReadingNovelReaderExpectationsHistoricalContemporaryTraditionalHistorical NovelsReading Experience Author:Danielle Dutton
“I loved reading historical novels when I was young, but I definitely don't think I wrote one. When I read my book through, when it was completely done and in printed galleys, I was surprised by how uninterested in the passage of time and history the book seemed to be. Even though you can feel it all there, that's just not what it's focused on.” ThinkingFeelsBookDoneYoungReadingNovelHistoricalFocusedPassagesPrintedPassage Of TimeUninterestedHistorical Novels Author:Danielle Dutton
“It's all just so fraught when you're writing and then going through the editorial process. It feels like this shape-shifting thing. When it's done, and you can't change a single word, it's a totally different thing. I was surprised by what that thing was.” FeelsWritingDifferentDoneProcessShapesDifferent ThingsShiftingCan't ChangeEditorialsSingle Word Author:Danielle Dutton
