Wales Literature Exchange interviewed our Bookshelf author Fflur Dafydd about her writing and influences.

1. What first inspired you to be an author and where do your ideas come from?

Writing was a very instinctive thing for me from a young age. I always had the urge to make stories, and create other realities, other universes. It wasn’t anything that I had to be asked to do, or forced to do - it was just always there - a compulsion. I loved having a competition deadline to get work finished, and once I had my own published pamphlet in my hand after winning the Literature Medal at the Urdd Eisteddfod I knew I would never turn back. My ideas come from everywhere - anywhere - life on the streets of my home town, overheard conversations, events, films, books, TV - I think that a writer is always open to every single thing becoming an idea in some way.

2. How would you describe your writing?

It has changed a lot over the years. It used to be quite lyrical, and also quite eccentric. I was into dystopia, alternative realities, and characters who were not quite of this world. Since becoming a screenwriter it’s definitely more concise and minimalist and grounded, and I’ve grown less eccentric with age, surprisingly! I have been described as offbeat, which I think is probably accurate. There is always a dark humour running through everything I write. If I try to write anything too serious - it never works.

3. Which authors have influenced you the most?

Kazuo Ishiguro is one of my favourite authors, probably because of the skilled way he handles any kind of dystopia or weirdness, and to this day I will always regret that when he came to speak to us as MA students at UEA I decided to go to the pub instead! I will also always find something to admire in the work of Maggie O Farrell; I know I’m in safe hands when I read her. Another writer who has greatly influenced me is my friend and long-term pen-pal Gunnhild Øyehaug, the Norwegian writer. We met in 2004 at the Hay Festival and have been writing to each other ever since. It wasn’t until a few years ago that I could read her in translation and her short stories and novels are always completely unpredictable, poetic, understated and strange, in the best way.

The single greatest influence on my work is that of the poet and vicar R.S. Thomas - the fascinating subject of my PhD thesis. I tend to ‘blame’ R.S. for nearly every single work I have published in some way or another - I followed his footsteps to the remote island of Bardsey, and ended up writing two novels set there; I came up with the idea for a novel and film set in a library while I was there researching him, and I even wrote a series featuring a vicar, after visiting his former parish church in Aberdaron. In the last book, Lloerganiadau, I thought I had finally escaped, but then I remembered that he had spent his boyhood in Llandysul, where I was brought up, which features heavily in the book. The pub in which I misspent my youth was once owned by his grandfather!

4. In your opinion what are the biggest challenges that writers face today – and do you think these challenges have changed since you started writing?

It’s very hard to make a living from writing fiction alone, even though it could actually be your richest contribution to culture - and most writers have to seek other jobs, which takes their time and attention away from writing fiction. “The creative writer’s suicide”, as R.S. Thomas would have it. Some writers are then drawn to TV because it allows them to make a living while also pursuing a narrative form - but it also then means that you will ultimately have to put your prose writing on hold, and learn to tell stories differently. I had to work very hard last year to get my memoir Lloerganiadau finished because I was working on a 6 part series at the same time, it was a real struggle to try to give them both the same energy. As much as I would love to write more fiction, there are only so many hours in the day, and I think that most writers are faced with these questions as they try to make a living out of writing, especially if they are also writing in more than one medium, and more than one language. Which project should I prioritise and why? Which one is the most important in the long run? Which language do I devote my attention to? Which one is culturally the most significant?

5. What are the hardest and easiest parts of being a writer?

The easiest part is that you get to just roll out of bed, sit at your desk, and all you have to do is start. The hardest part is actually starting. “Deuparth gwaith yw ei ddechrau,” as the old Welsh saying goes. Starting the work is two thirds of it!

6. Which writer from Wales would you recommend to readers and why?

Mihangel Morgan is my go-to, because he has such a wonderfully unique voice, unlike anyone else. He makes me see Wales through a completely different lens, and celebrates the oddities and quirks of Welsh characters, in a way that makes Wales feel vibrant and alive.

Lloerganiadau ('Moonmoir') is selected to the Wales Literature Exchange 2021–22 Bookcase, our annual selection of recent Welsh literary works which we recommend for translation.