Interview
TRUTH IN WAR: AN INTERVIEW WITH CYNTHIA GRAHAM
BY MICHAEL COMOROTO & mICHAEL fOTOS
2016
A reader’s initial reaction to Cynthia A. Graham’s novel Beneath Still Waters may be to categorize the piece a murder mystery as readers successfully locate the tropes that fit the genre. Along the way, however, we uncover a greater distinction, one of meaning and purpose. Graham explores the American military and its practices to bring forth conversations about the ethical responsibilities of having lives in our hands. Her findings set forth an army of questions to her reader’s who will inevitably battle with the ugly truths of being human.
Glassworks Magazine (GM): When evaluating texts readers often set the piece into its respective genre in order to best understand how it should be digested. Both Blank Slate Press and Amazon have labeled Beneath Still Waters a murder-mystery; however, in terms of symbolism, theme, and lyricism, we believe your novel transcends the boundaries of that genre. How would you categorize your work?
Cynthia Graham (CG): I consider myself to be an accidental mystery writer. It’s not a genre that I’m all that comfortable with, but it presented itself as the best avenue to explore the questions I was contemplating at the time, questions regarding individuals or nations deciding who is worthy of life and who is not. P. D. James said, “I don’t think writers choose the genre, the genre chooses us. I wrote out of the wish to create order out of disorder…” I did feel this overwhelming need to try and create order of the thoughts in my mind, and the genre of mystery was the most fitting to present the story I was trying to tell. It allowed me to capture the varied personal conflicts within the main characters. Hick, for example, is inadequately prepared to resolve the internal conflicts which resulted from his war experiences. Similarly, he finds himself forced to untangle a difficult and gruesome crime for which he feels equally inadequate and unprepared.
GM: The push and pull in Maggie and Hick’s relationship and the thrill of Hick’s survival near the end of the piece may allude to a romance novel or a thriller. Has the adherence to these genres affected story, theme and your discoveries throughout the writing process?
CG: I recognize that there are rules that any genre must follow, but my primary concern was to tell Hick’s story. The genre of mystery requires red herrings and although there are red herrings in the story, they are there only because they reflect Hick’s mental state, where he trusts no one and questions everything. The fact that Hick and Maggie come to an understanding at the end of the book (a convention of romance writing) happens because in my mind I never imagined it happening any other way.
GM: Despite finalizing his love connection with Maggie, a romance trope, Hick’s defining moment is associated with his actions in the war, particularly in regards to the death of a child. This premise has been explored in works in the past, but we believe your approach is unique. How does Hick’s actions and his motives differ from other retellings within similar genres?
CG: Hick has done a terrible thing and it is a burden he will carry with him the rest of his life. I can’t speak to other works, but I can say that Hick’s motive was fear-based, plain and simple. He was a young, inexperienced soldier who happened to end up in a desperate battle and I wanted to create a more realistic portrayal than we see in, say, a John Wayne movie. I kept coming back to the idea that these men we sent overseas were, in reality, teenagers, fresh out of high school, with little worldly experience or knowledge.
GM: Along with the unnerving images of young people battling with their lives, there are also concerns with how soldiers adjust after battle. How does your writing address the stresses of soldiers’ reintegration to society?
CG: Hick lives at a time where there was no mechanism for talking about internal trauma. Those whom we refer to as “the greatest generation” had to live with this internal conflict, with two personal realities, the internal and the external. While we now seem more amenable to allowing our soldiers to open up about these feelings, there is still the persistent struggle which war inevitably forces upon its participants.
Cynthia Graham (CG): I consider myself to be an accidental mystery writer. It’s not a genre that I’m all that comfortable with, but it presented itself as the best avenue to explore the questions I was contemplating at the time, questions regarding individuals or nations deciding who is worthy of life and who is not. P. D. James said, “I don’t think writers choose the genre, the genre chooses us. I wrote out of the wish to create order out of disorder…” I did feel this overwhelming need to try and create order of the thoughts in my mind, and the genre of mystery was the most fitting to present the story I was trying to tell. It allowed me to capture the varied personal conflicts within the main characters. Hick, for example, is inadequately prepared to resolve the internal conflicts which resulted from his war experiences. Similarly, he finds himself forced to untangle a difficult and gruesome crime for which he feels equally inadequate and unprepared.
GM: The push and pull in Maggie and Hick’s relationship and the thrill of Hick’s survival near the end of the piece may allude to a romance novel or a thriller. Has the adherence to these genres affected story, theme and your discoveries throughout the writing process?
CG: I recognize that there are rules that any genre must follow, but my primary concern was to tell Hick’s story. The genre of mystery requires red herrings and although there are red herrings in the story, they are there only because they reflect Hick’s mental state, where he trusts no one and questions everything. The fact that Hick and Maggie come to an understanding at the end of the book (a convention of romance writing) happens because in my mind I never imagined it happening any other way.
GM: Despite finalizing his love connection with Maggie, a romance trope, Hick’s defining moment is associated with his actions in the war, particularly in regards to the death of a child. This premise has been explored in works in the past, but we believe your approach is unique. How does Hick’s actions and his motives differ from other retellings within similar genres?
CG: Hick has done a terrible thing and it is a burden he will carry with him the rest of his life. I can’t speak to other works, but I can say that Hick’s motive was fear-based, plain and simple. He was a young, inexperienced soldier who happened to end up in a desperate battle and I wanted to create a more realistic portrayal than we see in, say, a John Wayne movie. I kept coming back to the idea that these men we sent overseas were, in reality, teenagers, fresh out of high school, with little worldly experience or knowledge.
GM: Along with the unnerving images of young people battling with their lives, there are also concerns with how soldiers adjust after battle. How does your writing address the stresses of soldiers’ reintegration to society?
CG: Hick lives at a time where there was no mechanism for talking about internal trauma. Those whom we refer to as “the greatest generation” had to live with this internal conflict, with two personal realities, the internal and the external. While we now seem more amenable to allowing our soldiers to open up about these feelings, there is still the persistent struggle which war inevitably forces upon its participants.
"He was a young, inexperienced soldier who happened to end up in a desperate battle and I wanted to create a more realistic portrayal than we see in, say, a John Wayne movie. I kept coming back to the idea that these men we sent overseas were, in reality, teenagers, fresh out of high school, with little worldly experience or knowledge."
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GM: You have proven these stresses along with those of war create strain on the psyche of its participants. How does Hick’s psychological battle with war and self say something about war today?
CG: Hick spent a sustained amount of time in a stressful situation. As a coping mechanism he decided that there are some more deserving of life than others. For Hick, this belief is a psychological necessity in battle because I don’t believe the human psyche does well with the notion of chaos. Hick had to organize his perceptions in a way that made survival something that is earned by being stronger, or a better fighter, enabling him to remove part of the chaos of war and give him some sense of control. This thinking becomes problematic when he is sent home and has to re-organize his thoughts to a more civilized lifestyle. Hick is suddenly placed in a situation where he has to find the killer of a child, a helpless, unnamed victim, and he is forced to re-learn that life is not the primitive, brutal existence he experienced on the battlefield. |
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GM: Story writing often encourages writers to evaluate their understanding of the topic they are exploring. In your exploration of the stresses of soldiers who are witnesses to brutality, what freedoms and/or motives have you discovered in your writing about such sensitive and important themes?
CG: I tried to put myself into the place of a young man leaving his home, a place of safety and familiarity, and going to war. I’m sure the idea of it would be exciting at first, but the reality of war would have to set in pretty quickly. I wanted to paint a picture of a regular guy who has to come home and try and make sense of what he’s seen and done. I imagine how jarring it would be to realize that, in spite of the tremendous trauma you’ve endured, nothing at home has changed. I would compare it to the way someone feels when they’ve lost a loved one. You leave the cemetery and everything looks the same and the same television shows are on, the stores are open, people are going to the supermarket, etc., and you can’t imagine how it is that the world is still spinning. That sense of isolation must be a terrible burden for a soldier. Nothing has changed for a majority of the world and, yet, from the returning soldier’s perspective, nothing will ever be the same.
GM: It seems Hick may always be burdened by war, specifically his actions to assure the safety of his platoon. Hick’s survival, we believe, is indicative of the absolution of his platoon’s actions; so, one could argue that your novel brings to light the values of protection, despite consequential civilian death. What is it that you would like your readers to explore about the values of self and life?
CG: What Hick did by mistake is amplified by his sergeant’s actions. It illustrates the dehumanization inherent in battle when Sergeant Brody declares the child was, “nothing but a kraut anyway.” What I wanted to illustrate is that, in spite of this, Sergeant Brody was a decent man. He was the one who helped Hick cope with the loss of his father, and he led Hick to the farmhouse, saving both of their lives. The knowledge that both good and evil are part of all of us is a powerful and sobering idea.
GM: Most novels only deal with morality on an individual scale. Beneath Still Waters, however, pushes those conventions by examining good and evil from both a civilian and military perspective, forcing the reader to contemplate whether or not it is ever necessary to kill in order to preserve the lives of those closest to you. Readers are encouraged to entertain a multitude of values that complicate ethical impulses. What was your goal in including your audience in the stresses of war and decision making?
CG: War is, at its heart, de-humanizing. It is a political incident which labels groups as enemies and creates this notion of the “alien” or the “other.” We view these individuals as unlike us and thereby deprive them of the basic rights of humanity, including the right to live in peace, and even the right to live at all. I find it interesting that when we feel threatened or angered by a group of individuals, one of the first things I hear is, “They’re like animals.” In a sense, this is how we justify ourselves. They’re not human; they are the other…the enemy. When you lose sight of the individual (whether it be in battle or your own neighborhood) when you forget that they are persons with families, dreams, and communities, it makes it easier to deprive them of those basic rights – it makes it easier to kill in combat. When a soldier returns, he is expected to return to normalcy – the perspective that all have the right to life. I tried to illustrate this turmoil with the character of Tobe, a sniper who comes home and realizes that with every soldier he killed, a legacy has been extinguished. He suddenly has the grim realization that the men he killed were more than targets; they had the potential to be fathers, husbands, uncles, and grandfathers.
CG: I tried to put myself into the place of a young man leaving his home, a place of safety and familiarity, and going to war. I’m sure the idea of it would be exciting at first, but the reality of war would have to set in pretty quickly. I wanted to paint a picture of a regular guy who has to come home and try and make sense of what he’s seen and done. I imagine how jarring it would be to realize that, in spite of the tremendous trauma you’ve endured, nothing at home has changed. I would compare it to the way someone feels when they’ve lost a loved one. You leave the cemetery and everything looks the same and the same television shows are on, the stores are open, people are going to the supermarket, etc., and you can’t imagine how it is that the world is still spinning. That sense of isolation must be a terrible burden for a soldier. Nothing has changed for a majority of the world and, yet, from the returning soldier’s perspective, nothing will ever be the same.
GM: It seems Hick may always be burdened by war, specifically his actions to assure the safety of his platoon. Hick’s survival, we believe, is indicative of the absolution of his platoon’s actions; so, one could argue that your novel brings to light the values of protection, despite consequential civilian death. What is it that you would like your readers to explore about the values of self and life?
CG: What Hick did by mistake is amplified by his sergeant’s actions. It illustrates the dehumanization inherent in battle when Sergeant Brody declares the child was, “nothing but a kraut anyway.” What I wanted to illustrate is that, in spite of this, Sergeant Brody was a decent man. He was the one who helped Hick cope with the loss of his father, and he led Hick to the farmhouse, saving both of their lives. The knowledge that both good and evil are part of all of us is a powerful and sobering idea.
GM: Most novels only deal with morality on an individual scale. Beneath Still Waters, however, pushes those conventions by examining good and evil from both a civilian and military perspective, forcing the reader to contemplate whether or not it is ever necessary to kill in order to preserve the lives of those closest to you. Readers are encouraged to entertain a multitude of values that complicate ethical impulses. What was your goal in including your audience in the stresses of war and decision making?
CG: War is, at its heart, de-humanizing. It is a political incident which labels groups as enemies and creates this notion of the “alien” or the “other.” We view these individuals as unlike us and thereby deprive them of the basic rights of humanity, including the right to live in peace, and even the right to live at all. I find it interesting that when we feel threatened or angered by a group of individuals, one of the first things I hear is, “They’re like animals.” In a sense, this is how we justify ourselves. They’re not human; they are the other…the enemy. When you lose sight of the individual (whether it be in battle or your own neighborhood) when you forget that they are persons with families, dreams, and communities, it makes it easier to deprive them of those basic rights – it makes it easier to kill in combat. When a soldier returns, he is expected to return to normalcy – the perspective that all have the right to life. I tried to illustrate this turmoil with the character of Tobe, a sniper who comes home and realizes that with every soldier he killed, a legacy has been extinguished. He suddenly has the grim realization that the men he killed were more than targets; they had the potential to be fathers, husbands, uncles, and grandfathers.
GM: Hick is able to see the impact of war and has learned lessons that value life and the protection of others. However, in the midst of stress, Hick concerns himself with reporter, Wayne Murphy. Murphy’s arguments value the telling of truth to all individuals as means of protection, but perhaps he goes too far. What does having a character like Murphy say about the way news confronts truths?
CG: Wayne Murphy is representative of the kind of sensational journalism that the 24/7 cable news outlets have created. He is so pre-occupied with making a buck that he never considers how the story will affect Iva Lee (a minor), her family, or the community at large. I am not advocating the idea that journalists should censor themselves, rather I wonder at what point the public is best served by learning the salacious details of a crime. Murphy’s questioning of Iva Lee has less to do with finding solutions and more to do with titillation...selling newspapers. When we become so obsessed with sensationalism, it becomes difficult to explain and explore pertinent issues.
GM: Murphy’s actions say a lot about our world today and what we value. We are curious as to how other characters explore their own sets of values. Claire Thompson, for example has perhaps the most pressing and stressful decisions to make. Before she is taken into custody, Hick prevents Claire Thompson from committing suicide. Does the attempt at suicide reveal that the values of life and survival is not apparent for everyone?
CG: Claire Thompson, through years of hardship, had an overarching need for control. I would say, in her instance, that control was more important than living a life where she would face scandal and jail time, if not execution. For Claire, taking her own life, rather than facing the consequences of her actions, was her last ditch effort at retaining control.
GM: Your novel measures the extreme lengths to which people will go in order to survive. How does one make sense of this human drive? Is this drive inherent, or is it created by circumstances that surround your characters such as with Claire Thompson?
CG: I believe that human beings are hard-wired for cooperation and that mothers instinctively need to care for and protect their young. Clearly, Claire Thompson has had a difficult life. She has spent so much of her life in dire and desperate circumstances that she has lost perspective and imagination. She is no longer able to fathom what life might be and is only able to grasp what is directly in front of her. Her desperation enables her to only see obstacles that needed to be removed, rather than the potential that might have been. This loss of proportion and hope in Claire, is certainly created by circumstances. Raised in poverty, with no personal power, Claire grasps at whatever she can to give herself an illusion of control
GM: While Beneath Still Waters is a tale of secrets and deceit, it is also a tale of healing and community. How does Hick’s reconciliation with Maggie at the end of the novel demonstrate a change in his character? Is he healed? Moreover, has the town recovered from the murder?
CG: As far as the town recovering from the murder, I would say only those most closely touched, the Stantons and the Thompson boys, would have any lingering pain. It is as with any great tragedy, we may all remember where we were on 9/11 but only those who were there or who lost someone still carry that intense ache and loss. I wouldn’t say Hick is healed at the end of the novel. Certainly, he has learned that there is still hope, and that life is still worth living. In Behind Every Door, the sequel that is coming out in March, we see that Hick has made some strides, but I really don’t know if one ever completely heals from war. My uncles that served in World War Two came home with nightmares, anxiety, and alcoholism and these things did not go away…ever. The war didn’t end for these men overseas. They came home and continued to bravely fight just to live lives of normalcy and honor. To their credit, they largely succeeded in forging a legacy of value and dignity.
CG: Wayne Murphy is representative of the kind of sensational journalism that the 24/7 cable news outlets have created. He is so pre-occupied with making a buck that he never considers how the story will affect Iva Lee (a minor), her family, or the community at large. I am not advocating the idea that journalists should censor themselves, rather I wonder at what point the public is best served by learning the salacious details of a crime. Murphy’s questioning of Iva Lee has less to do with finding solutions and more to do with titillation...selling newspapers. When we become so obsessed with sensationalism, it becomes difficult to explain and explore pertinent issues.
GM: Murphy’s actions say a lot about our world today and what we value. We are curious as to how other characters explore their own sets of values. Claire Thompson, for example has perhaps the most pressing and stressful decisions to make. Before she is taken into custody, Hick prevents Claire Thompson from committing suicide. Does the attempt at suicide reveal that the values of life and survival is not apparent for everyone?
CG: Claire Thompson, through years of hardship, had an overarching need for control. I would say, in her instance, that control was more important than living a life where she would face scandal and jail time, if not execution. For Claire, taking her own life, rather than facing the consequences of her actions, was her last ditch effort at retaining control.
GM: Your novel measures the extreme lengths to which people will go in order to survive. How does one make sense of this human drive? Is this drive inherent, or is it created by circumstances that surround your characters such as with Claire Thompson?
CG: I believe that human beings are hard-wired for cooperation and that mothers instinctively need to care for and protect their young. Clearly, Claire Thompson has had a difficult life. She has spent so much of her life in dire and desperate circumstances that she has lost perspective and imagination. She is no longer able to fathom what life might be and is only able to grasp what is directly in front of her. Her desperation enables her to only see obstacles that needed to be removed, rather than the potential that might have been. This loss of proportion and hope in Claire, is certainly created by circumstances. Raised in poverty, with no personal power, Claire grasps at whatever she can to give herself an illusion of control
GM: While Beneath Still Waters is a tale of secrets and deceit, it is also a tale of healing and community. How does Hick’s reconciliation with Maggie at the end of the novel demonstrate a change in his character? Is he healed? Moreover, has the town recovered from the murder?
CG: As far as the town recovering from the murder, I would say only those most closely touched, the Stantons and the Thompson boys, would have any lingering pain. It is as with any great tragedy, we may all remember where we were on 9/11 but only those who were there or who lost someone still carry that intense ache and loss. I wouldn’t say Hick is healed at the end of the novel. Certainly, he has learned that there is still hope, and that life is still worth living. In Behind Every Door, the sequel that is coming out in March, we see that Hick has made some strides, but I really don’t know if one ever completely heals from war. My uncles that served in World War Two came home with nightmares, anxiety, and alcoholism and these things did not go away…ever. The war didn’t end for these men overseas. They came home and continued to bravely fight just to live lives of normalcy and honor. To their credit, they largely succeeded in forging a legacy of value and dignity.
