Issue 3: Interview with Miriam Webster
“1. At the beach there is dirty seafoam like a coffee stain along the lip of the shore. The abject froth calls to mind memories of the time you had an affair with a married man. You want to write a story about it but worry that the story is unoriginal.”
~ Seafoam Fantasy by Miriam Webster
Your short story "Seafoam Fantasy" is an account of an affair between a teacher and a university student - a common fantasy written with a self-reflexive twist. Can you tell us about your inspiration behind the piece?
This is such a weird collage of influences it’s hard to say where it all started. There’s the mythic origin of seafoam (bizarre), some naughty academics me and my friends have dealt with (sleazy), things my teacher said in class (clever + funny), and Lorrie Moore’s use of humour to tell stories about women’s lives (masterful). But if I’m totally honest, this story is my love letter and revenge on a certain type of man. You know him! He’s sexy, well-read, fragile, manipulative. I’ve been involved with him too many times, and I always fall for him even though my mum, my sisters and my friends all tell me he’s a wanker. I find out he sucks in the end, and eventually my feelings of shame give way to a murderous rage. And instead of confronting this man about toxic masculinity in a heathy, mature way, I’ve stored up every entitled and atrocious thing he’s ever said or done to me, and waited to use it in a story. When Issue 3 comes out, perhaps I’ll mail a copy to each of my exes.
The piece is written in the second person, and structured in 38 short numbered vignettes. How did you go about developing this voice and structure? Did it change throughout the writing process?
I’m obsessed with what I call ‘writing through the fragment’, which is why it’s in those little vignettes. I’m interested in the fragment as the symptom of our disjointed, internet-led era. We communicate in all these little snippets, and I wonder how such a brief, sometimes unfinished form, can be made to convey a wealth of meaning. Sometimes I find it hard to write short stories in the first person, but the second person voice is so much fun! I like my women characters to be clever but also a bit hopeful and idealistic, and I find the second person is a good way of playing with this conflict. There is a line in Anne Carson’s Nox about telling the truth while allowing it to be seen hiding, and I think writing in the second person does this by deploying generalisations and narrative conventions, but subverting them from within.
How important is play and experimentation in your work?
I love play and experimentation! I’m not a very imaginative writer in the sense that I can’t really make stuff up, but I get very excited about collaging my own experiences with everything I’ve read, and riffing off this. I basically get all of life’s lessons from books and astrology, which is a silly way to be, but I’m happy to admit this and make a joke of it in my work. I’m not subtle either, and I particularly like it when there is a really obvious conversation going on between the work and its literary influences. I try to mention mine by name – hence including Lorrie Moore, Maggie Nelson, and Jane Austen in this one.
You mention some great writers in your piece, such as Lorrie Moore and Maggie Nelson. What are you reading at the moment?
On your recommendation Emily (via insta a little while ago): Hilma Wolitzer’s story collection Today A Woman Went Mad in the Supermarket!! It’s so incisive and generous, which I think is a perfect combination. I’m over here taking notes – I want to be as wise and funny, as sad and smiling as her.
Miriam Webster is a student of creative writing living in Melbourne/Naarm. You can find recent examples of her fiction and creative nonfiction in Aniko, Issue 2 and Island online. She writes about women, ecology, the places we inhabit, the lovers we keep, and the sometimes unbearable torment of living.