An Interview with Pina Irace

An Interview with Pina Irace

 

Pina Irace is the author of the following two picture story books.  I came to know Pina through Facebook, where she liked my post featuring my blog passage introducing her book “The Burping Sun”.  It is amazing to make friend with an overseas author and I have got lots of questions to ask her.  Here is the interview that I have conducted with Pina Irace. 

Sara: Hi, Pina.  As a reader in Hong Kong, I have read two of your books translated to Chinese, including “The Burping Sun” and “The Leaf Conductor” and I love them.  Can you tell us more about yourself?  How did you start to write picture story books?

Pina: Hi Sara, I was born in Positano, a beautiful village on the sea in the south of Italy.  After a long period in Rome, I currently live in Reggio Emilia, a city in the north of Italy near Bologna.  Actress, storyteller and mom, I conduct theater workshops for children and adults and promote for reading, too.  I love the words: the written words of the books, the living words of the theater, the words in images of cinema, the words I write, use and tell. The strength of my blue sea and the melancholy fog of the lowland coexist happily in me.

Sara: Are you an Italian?  Do you think your book reveals the culture of Italy?  What do you think are the characteristics of Italian culture? 

Pina: Yes I’m Italian but when I write, all the awesomeness of the different cultures that I discover in travels and books come out.  In Italy art has gone through many centuries and left us many traces, we live with this beauty and I believe our culture is inspired so much by beauty.  We want to renew it endlessly.

Sara: You are an amateur writer.  What is your main job?  Would you find it difficult to work and write at the same time?  How can you balance the two? 

Pina: I'm an actress but I already wrote theatrical pieces and screenplays for short films, writing has always been a great passion.  Over time I approached children's theater, especially storytelling, and I started to stage mine and others’ stories.  “The Leaf Conductor” is part of the show "The Four Seasons", so the Italian publisher ZOOlibri, as soon as he heard it, decided to publish a picture book with the beautiful drawings of Marìa Moya.  My work and my passion for children's books are therefore closely linked and one enriches the other.

Sara: Your books have been translated into many languages around the world.  How many languages are they in?  Do they allow you to meet more friends and learn more about other cultures?

Pina: My books have been translated into simplified and traditional Chinese, Japanese, Portuguese, Danish, Korean and Hebrew.  Yes, I met many people through social networks and I am particularly attached to a lady from Japan who introduced me to Japanese culture and we are very good friends now.

Sara: I read your book “The Burping Sun” and wrote a passage in my blog.  One of my observations to the book was that “When the logic of reality aligns with the logic of fantasy, it gives the story its soul.” Here is an example: The ways of tackling burping match so well with the properties of natural phenomena like sea and wind, and you gave those natural phenomena their characters.  Are they a mere and perfect coincidence? Or have you spent a lot of effort on it?  Can you share with us how you have come to those ideas?

Pina: When my son was baby, he asked me: what if the sun had hiccups?  I suddenly imagined the sun as a person, with his problem to enlighten and the expedients to heal: a solidarity and friendship story was born.  I’m a theater actress, I always write a character to play it, I try to draw well his personality and his characteristics, even if it is unreal, as an element of nature, and so the wind becomes a man always in a hurry, the sea is a rich lady travelling, the thunder is a scary big man.  While I write, I often play my characters.

Sara: You book “The Leaf Conductor” depicts movements of leaves in details.  Did you spend a lot of time observing leaves?  How did you turn your observation into writing?  Are there any skills that you can share with our young readers? 

Pina: I always say that stories are hidden everywhere, we just have to find them.  It was autumn and I waited for my children out of the school.  I watched the leaves falling, they were all different and moved in different ways just like the children, like we have to let our children go around the world.  Inspiration can come from a word or an image, then I ask myself: what does it look like? What it reminds me of? Then, when the characters grow up, I place obstacles: what would happen if The Leaf Conductor did not arrive? It's a fun game.

Sara:  In “The Leaf Conductor”, I think the conductor meant to be the rhythm in nature that governs the climate.  Is it the way you intend?  Do you think the image of the “Conductor” in your book presents your idea well?

Pina: Sure, that's it.  The Conductor, as I told before, is one of the stories about the 4 seasons, I imagined in each of them an essential character because when every season comes, there is a kind of modern mythology.  Only the autumn’s story became an illustrated book, for now.  I immediately loved Marìa Moya's drawings, as well as those of Valeria Valenza, I like and respect the point of view of the illustrators.  They gave me a pleasant surprise each time. I love the Conductor’s image as half-man half-bird, he is suspended between the earth and the sky like his falling leaves.

Sara: Are you involved in the drawing part of the story books?  How would you be involved, right before the drawing starts or at other stages?

Pina: The editor shows me the drawings during the work in progress but I trust him and his team very much.

Sara: What are your future plans about writing?  Will Hong Kong readers be able to read more of your works? Finally, would you have some words to the Hong Kong Readers?

Pina: A new book is coming out in 2018 in Italy and I have other amazing projects.  I hope that Hong Kong readers have the chance to read my next books too.

Dear Hong Kong readers,

I am very proud that my stories came to you.  I often say: - if you want to find me, look for me in my stories - so, now you know that a small part of me is there with you.  Thank you.

Pina Irace

(January 2018)