THE INTERVIEWS MARINA WARNER … talks about life as an independent scholar, and why fairy tales matter so much to us Compared to many other Fellows of a university in a very distinguished way; in his day, the British Academy, you have a rather he eked out his living on Grub Street� diff erent career story. After graduating, you went straight into journalism – the You interviewed the fi lm director Bernardo Berto- Daily Telegraph Magazine and Vogue. lucci as well as fi gures like Glenda Jackson for Vogue, Th ose must have been interesting times. and Jean-Luc Godard for the Observer. You later I know my career has been very irregular� interviewed Margaret Th atcher shortly after she had Even when I was at school, I was always become Leader of the Opposition in 1975. Were those getting reports saying ‘erratic’! formative experiences? I wanted to fi nance my own writing, A fashion magazine like Vogue is a female world� and journalism in those days was defi - Th ere really were very few men working there (just Dame Marina Warner nitely compatible with that� V�S� Naipaul, some in the upper echelons running the money side), is Professor of English a features writer on the Daily Telegraph so it was very like the convent where I had gone to and Creative Writing at Birkbeck University of Magazine when I worked there, was one boarding school� I had changed from one entirely London. She was elected of several very distinguished authors who female environment to another, with rather compa- a Fellow of the British practised journalism in order to fund the rable fi gures of authority: the Reverend Mother was Academy in 2005. writing and research of their books� Th is quite a model for the Chief Editor of Vogue� (I don’t was a common pattern in the 1970s when think Alexandra Shulman would think that now! I was fi rst becoming a serious writer� But But Beatrix Miller, known to us as ‘Miss Miller’, was this use of journalism to support writing defi nitely of the same ilk as a Reverend Mother�) has changed� Somebody like George In the features that I wrote there was a common Orwell is likely now to be a Professor of Creative thread of interest in how women were represented� Writing, or a Professor of Journalism, or even a Pro- Th e avant-garde fi lmmakers of the time included fessor of Cultural or Media Studies, teaching in strong female roles, which were important in the 34 J4524_BAR_Issue_28_Summer_2016_V29.indd 34 16/06/2016 11:39 SUMMER 2016 BRITISH ACADEMY REVIEW 1960s for shaping ideas about sex and relationships� interest in anything, my father, who was a bookseller, Godard, particularly, didn’t explore women’s lives in would bring us material of all kinds – books, jour- an admirable, profound way, but women and their nals, magazines – back from the shop� My question desires were foregrounded� So it was an arena where ‘What is China?’ produced a marvellous stash for my interest in this aspect of experience could be me to look at, and it was immediately very seductive� pressed forward� Even the script is aesthetically satisfying, and the art I was pleased that a woman had been elected is wonderful� leader of the Conservatives; I thought this was a I particularly fell in love with Chinese civilisa- great breakthrough� But I’m afraid Margaret Thatch- tion, because it was so ancient and had shown such er let me down in the very first moments of the in- strong interest in poetry, philosophy, nature, seclu- terview, because she was patronising – it was almost sion and reflectiveness� As a teenager I was already ‘There, there, little girl’ – which was a huge mistake� I very uneasy with Christian patterns of sacrifice, and I only had ten minutes with her, so I asked her a rapid still am� In terms of cosmology, Buddhism, Confu- series of questions� One of them was ‘Do you believe cianism and Daoism are in general all rather more in God?’ She was very cross and protested furious- serene than Judaeo-Christianity� ly that of course she did, but she condescended to me while answering it, so she revealed herself in an Do you think there are different opportunities and interesting way� different pressures for an independent scholar? In those decades, we were still looking for role I have thought about this a lot� models and for exemplary women� We could find My career would not have been possible inside them amongst the exceptions� In fact, in my pattern the academic world – until the point when I was of writing, the subjects have moved from exceptional embraced by it� For one thing, I didn’t really have a women to ordinary women� I started with the Em- subject� At Oxford I read French and Italian� But I press of China,1 and went on to the Virgin Mary�2 wanted to decipher the Then I became interested in anonymous fairytale world� I wanted to look at tellers – the figures of the old crone and Mother how things related to the Goose – and in the vernacular, anonymous body of In those decades, we stories we were being told� literature which was often created by women who were still looking for I had been brought up a could not read and write� This shift in my inquiries Catholic and I had been role models and for reflects the changes in feminism, as its interest was brought up on stories� I moving from examples of exceptional heroines to exemplary women. knew they had made my explore the structures that produced gender inequali- imagination’s picture of ties – and possibilities� the world, as laid out by the Catholic religion that You wrote that first book about the Empress Dowager I belonged to� I wanted to understand that� of China whilst still at Vogue. My work doesn’t fall very easily into any cate- I did a lot of research into what is called ‘Treaty Port gory, and that is extremely difficult for the academic Literature’, and I was very aware that I couldn’t read disciplines to accommodate� I wanted to investigate Chinese� I wanted to study Chinese at university, the texture of reality as I experienced it, and that but I was strongly advised not to try because I didn’t seemed to me to need a cross-disciplinary approach� already have any� After Oxford, I applied for schol- My questions couldn’t fit into French language arships to learn Chinese, but I was turned down� My from 1800 to 1900, or Italian Renaissance studies� career would have been entirely changed! I sensed that such cultural expressions were rather My interest in China was probably sparked by more interconnected in a dynamic way, so I tried to Rupert Bear� This is a good investigate that� example of how popular The division between academic subjects and literature puts one onto between periods can cause rigidity, a rigidity that extraordinary paths� In doesn’t always allow for fertile fission� Rupert Bear there is an In my career, I’ve tried to write my non-fiction emperor of China who work in a creative way, and develop a rich, dramatic flies around on a carpet, style� My models are Virginia Woolf and George and I was fascinated by Orwell, whose critical writings are still literature� this figure when I was very That is what I have wanted to pursue� young� And any time my My fiction writing is always seen separately sister or I ever showed any from my non-fiction writing� People in this country 1. Marina Warner, The Dragon Empress: The Life and Times of Tz’u-hsi, Empress Dowager of China, 1835–1980 (1972). 2. Marina Warner, Alone of All Her Sex: The Myth and the Cult of the Virgin Mary (1976; reissued by Oxford University Press, 2013). 35 J4524_BAR_Issue_28_Summer_2016_V29.indd 35 16/06/2016 11:39 THE Interviews think it’s more of a dilettante thing that I do� It isn’t You were elected a Fellow of the British Academy dilettantism: it’s dedicated in the same spirit to the in 2005, just a year after you became a Professor at pursuit of something I want to understand – or at the University of Essex. Did that recognition by the least describe� British Academy of everything you had done up to that point, outside the normal university system, seem As an independent scholar living off your writing, you particularly valuable to you? had the pressure of having to produce books that sold. I was astonished, and I continue to be completely Yes� I had some very lean years, partly because in the astonished when I see the extraordinarily complex 1980s I was married to a painter, so we didn’t have a and arduous process by which Fellows get elected� I real professional salary between us� must say, it made a huge difference to me� I have a I was increasingly being invited to lecture� This bit of trouble with recognition, because it makes me developed organically� I was really beginning to be feel like an impostor� I was very, very pleased, and I entirely supported by invitations to America or to still am� Europe� The very first large act of support came from the Getty Institute of Humanities in Cali- How have your interests progressed? Has one project fornia� They telephoned me (this happened before moved seamlessly into another? the Internet) and invited me to join a year that was Yes� They are all interconnected, including the novels� focusing on religious symbolism� They knew my They all arise from questions that the last piece of work on the Virgin Mary� It was a wonderful year for research has left dangling� me (1987–88), and my first entry into higher scholarly Fiction gives you permission not to make up your circles� mind� You obviously don’t want to be too didactic or too schematic� My novel The Lost Father was about In 2004, you became Professor in the Department of my mother’s childhood�4 She was born in the year Literature, Film, and Theatre Studies at the University Mussolini came into power and married my father of Essex.