Zambra:
I’ve been writing most of my life; it’s just something I do. There is a big difference between writing and publishing. I don’t have any doubts that I need writing. I need it personally because this is the way I think. Publishing my book is like giving it away. At first you start talking about it, but you are basically letting go. I won’t say it’s like giving birth because I haven’t given birth. It’s more like when your children leave home. Everything is done. You raised them, you want them to be happy and you want people to love them; but it’s not your thing anymore. You are probably writing another novel of another type. For me, writing is a way of finding out about things I didn’t know before I began writing. I just write. That’s why I was telling you about my previous manuscript about 1993. I was writing it because I was supposed to publish something, but I couldn’t write it that way.
Interviewer:
So writing can be a way of keeping track of what we are thinking, a way of expanding upon what we are thinking.
Zambra:
Yeah, and dealing with it. We rely too much on the people we share our lives with. We hold them responsible for things they are not even aware of. We start blaming them. If you write, and you are really alone (writing is a lonely thing), you learn to be alone without suffering. When you read, you also learn to do this. When you write, you deal with things.