Mary Magazine

Peter Orner

Peter Orner is just as drawn to listening to people tell stories about their lives as he is to writing them himself. The tradition of oral history plays an integral role in his writing, both fiction and non-fiction alike. His passion for interviewing and learning about people via these interviews allows him to wring out of that experience some of the best fiction and most captivating voices being written today. His stories instantly transport you, take you out of your life, and evoke every detail and shred of the people he has carefully and thoughtfully created. And though his range of characters are as diverse as one could imagine, all of his writings share one important trait, something the best writing usually does: it stays with you long after you have finished it. And Orner does not need many pages to do all this. I first came across his work and heard him speak a number of years ago at UC Riverside. After his reading, someone asked him about Flash Fiction, including his work under that moniker. He immediately bristled. For Orner, then and now, a story is as long as it needs to be; there is far too much emphasis and too much time wasted on categorizing work or deciding what it should be called. Orner has better ways to spend his time, writing books, for example. And he’s good people.

I met Peter in his cozy office at San Francisco State University for this interview, where, surrounded by shelves teeming with books, an old typewriter, and the occasional student that he helped best he could while I struggled with the tape recorder, we spoke about his work, America's obsession with categorizing everything we read, and what Peter does when he's not working – which is essentially working. Also, we spoke about Pete Rose.

Patrick Holian
December 2008
San Francisco, California

Patrick Holian: This is my first interview, so if I flub anything or if this recorder blows up, I apologize. This is a preemptive apology.

Peter Orner: Having done these and messed them up, if you want to check anything, feel free. I’ve done that, where the thing isn’t on, and oh, we’ve just talked for two hours. It’s the worst. I’m sure you’ll do great.

PMH: Well, keep your fingers crossed. I wanted to congratulate you on the publishing of Underground America. I was wondering if you could talk a little bit about the book, and maybe how you see non-fiction interacting with your fiction.

PO: Sure, thanks. The book is an oral history collection, and the intent of the book is to listen to undocumented people living and working in the US and listen to their stories. I thought it was important because you always hear about undocumented immigrants taking jobs and committing crimes, but you never hear what the majority of them go through on a day-to-day basis. We’re talking about upwards of 20 million good, law-abiding people here. Most of them have fairly, no, very hard lives. Part of the intent of the book is to show that these people are living in this country in a way that is invisible to us, and at the same time they’re right in front of our faces. The same laws that protect us documented people do nothing for them, and they go through serious hardships as a result. We don’t know what they go through in the fields or factories, on the streets, and in detention facilities.

I’m very interested in oral history as a way of getting people’s stories. In my fiction I interview people constantly, ask them to talk about themselves, and try and get as deeply into their lives as I can. Oral history is pretty consistent with the fiction I write.

PMH: I thought that was definitely evident in both The Second Coming and Esther Stories. I was really impressed by both, and I think an engaging aspect of your writing, which I found in both books, is your ability to render so many different voices and characters uniquely and distinctly. The interplay between these disparate people and points of view is one element of your work that makes it dynamic. You said at one point that you didn’t want to get into writing The Second Coming until you really understood the place, really knew Namibia. I get that sense with all of your characters, whether it be the collection of stories or the novel. I feel as though you understand each your characters intimately and that you know all of them thoroughly, as you did Namibia.

PO: Thank you. They both seem different, yet you make me realize that they’re not so different. I’m personally interested in doing the best I can to get to know the place and the people as well as I can before I write. But, I think at a certain point you just have to fly blind. That’s what fiction often is for me, flying blind. With non-fiction, I’m tethered, but with fiction you often let go of facts. I think a lot of what we do is tricky in the best sense of the word trick. I think fiction is a conjuring act, and if you believe it I’m happy. And I’m praying that you believe it—you know what I mean—but I worked my ass off to try and get Namibia right because I love it. I lived in Namibia in the early nineties and I went back a number of times to do research for the book, and on those trips I did a number of interviews, immersed myself in the culture and stories, and collected literally hundreds and hundreds of pages of anecdotes about the place because I became so fascinated with it. Namibians have read the book and have said, God, you’ve captured this place, but I wasn’t really ready to do it until I was sure that I could make that leap. The preliminary work gives you confidence to do the real work; it’s almost like a bit of a crutch. Then you have to make that leap, you leave the research behind and let these characters act and interact. You make that blind leap and trust yourself.

PMH: Yeah, I was struck with how you capture place throughout the novel yet you don’t exoticize it. Storytelling is so intrinsic to Namibia, it’s such an important part of these people’s lives and I felt that you utilized that fact as a way to not only immerse the reader into this very unique environment, but also into these characters you’ve created.

PO: Thanks. Do you write about place? Where are you from?

PMH: I do write about place. I’m from San Francisco actually. I was born in the Marina district and then moved to South San Francisco but continued going to school in the city.

<< | 1, 2, 3, 4, 5 | >>

PATRICK HOLIAN was born and raised in San Francisco. He currently works out of and resides in South San Francisco, The Industrial City, coming to St. Mary’s after graduating from UC Riverside in 2005. The 2007 recipient of the Chester Aaron Scholarship, Patrick has made awnings, broken the largest bone in the human body (his own), and cut school to meet Joe Montana.

PETER ORNER is the author of a collection of short stories, Esther Stories, a Finalist for the Los Angeles Times Book Prize and winner of the Bard Fiction Prize for his next book, the novel The Second Coming of Mavala Shikongo, his work can be found in The Atlantic Monthly and The Paris Review, and he recently edited Underground America: Narratives of Undocumented Lives, a non-fiction book documenting the lives of illegal immigrants living and working in the United States.