Ann Napolitano
Since my children were born, I have become a writing nomad. Essentially, I can and will write anywhere that my two young sons are not. Usually this entails leaving my apartment. Several frequently utilized locations are: a bedroom at my parents’ house in New Jersey, a library for the blind in Chelsea, the basement of a Starbucks in Brooklyn, and the second floor of two separate McDonalds (one in Manhattan and one in Brooklyn). I have become flexible, or maybe desperate, depending on how you look at it. Desperately flexible.
However, my favorite place to write, hands down, is the couch in our apartment. The bulk of A Good Hard Look was written on this couch. I like to work on a couch, because then I can tell myself that I’m not working. People work at desks. They have fun on couches. Right? Writing involves playing mind games with oneself. For instance, I will write for thirty minutes and then I’m allowed to read the internet for five minutes. Or, I will not let myself stand up until I write three pages. Or, I am enjoying writing this novel, dammit, because I am sitting on a couch.
When I look up from the computer screen, there are two thin walls in my range of vision. The first is occupied by two photographic portraits by Richard Avedon that a friend gave me almost twenty years ago. The frames are plastic and probably cost ten dollars each. Samuel Beckett, rail-thin and profoundly wrinkled, stands with his hands in his pockets against a white backdrop. Beneath him, W.H. Auden is walking down a snowy New York City sidewalk. They each look like they haven’t smiled in about a decade. When I’m feeling frustrated or despairing about my work, their dour faces tell me in no uncertain terms to just get on with it. I find their grumpiness strangely comforting.
The second wall features a framed needlepoint of the cover of my first novel, Within Arm’s Reach,which my mother made for me. The sight reminds me, firstly, how sweet my mother is, and secondly that I once successfully completed a novel, and can therefore probably do so again. During the seven long years it took me to write my new book, A Good Hard Look, I appreciated that reminder.
Ann Napolitano is the author of the novels A Good Hard Look and Within Arm’s Reach. She received an MFA from New York University; she teaches fiction writing for New York University’s School of Continuing and Professional Studies and for Gotham Writers’ Workshop. She lives in New York City with her husband and two children.
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