Good Folk

The Memphis Commercial-Appeal profiles writers (and married couple) Tom Franklin and Beth Ann Fennelly, who also happen to be old friends of yours truly.  Friends of mine or not, I highly recommend their books:

Their corner backyard is spacious, stippled with sun and shade. A patio holds a round wood table and chairs, a bottle tree shining with green and blue glass, and a swing suspended from a frame. Next to the patio is a studio and guest-house built after Franklin lost his office to the children. This is where Franklin writes; Fennelly has a desk and computer in the bedroom.

"Writing is a daily routine," said Fennelly. "Every day I try to find time to be alone, usually in the morning. I have to sit down at my desk and be in the moment, do some reading and try not to get down on myself."

Fennelly often relates her poems to what she sees and hears around her.

"Sometimes it's a curious image," she said, "or something that I read or that I overhear. Moments of tension and complexity. Sometimes I'm not even aware of it. I just know that it's something I want to get down."

Writing the poem is an act of sorting things out, finding the form, the vehicle for words.

"We think that our emotions are always really clear and transparent," said Fennelly, "but they're not. Only when we speak and write clearly can we change the world."

Even dedicated writers need help being clear and transparent, however, and when writers live together, they tend to read each other's work.

"We love books, we love words," said Fennelly. "Tommy reads all my poems."

"I'm not nearly as much help to Beth Ann as she is to me," said Franklin. "I've had a lot of editors, but she's the best. She doesn't just think line by line. She'll say 'You don't need this character' or 'This scene needs to be compressed,' and she's always right."