Sarah-Jane Stratford is the author of the new novel Red Letter Days. She also has written the novel Radio Girls, and her work has appeared in a variety of publications, including The Guardian and The Boston Globe. She grew up in Los Angeles, and lives in London.
Q: Why did you decide to
write about the Hollywood blacklist of the 1950s in your new novel?
A: After the 2016 election, I
was despondent. I then got to thinking about American history and times when
the country had not, shall we say, lived up to its own ideals.
I got to thinking about the
blacklist, and the Red Scare in general - the way a fear of the Other has
always prompted the worst in human behaviour, and this time around that fear
was used by the government to persecute not just avowed communists but anyone
liberal, or otherwise fighting for greater civil liberties and rights.
It was extraordinary, really,
because the country had just emerged victorious from the war, prosperity was on
the rise, and the future was decidedly bright. And yet, voices pointing out
where the country was imperfect were forcibly silenced.
I wanted to explore this and
in particular, I wanted to explore it from the point of view of women under
attack. To the extent most people know about the blacklist, they know about the
Hollywood Ten. And that’s a fascinating story.
But if there’s one thing I
learned when studying history, it’s that there are always people whose stories
aren’t getting told, and much of the time those people are women. I knew women
had suffered under the blacklist and I wanted to tell their stories.
Q: You note that your
character Hannah was inspired by Hannah Weinstein, who founded the Sapphire
studio in London. How did you balance the fictional Hannah with the historical
one, and how did you create your character Phoebe?
A: Hannah Weinstein was a
brave, ambitious, inspiring woman. When I read that she hired only blacklisted
writers to write scripts for the shows she produced, I knew this was going to
be the foundation of the book.
The workplace Hannah remains
fairly close to the real woman; where I made changes was to her personal life.
Some points were small, like she actually had three children, whereas I give
her only two, and others quite a bit more significant - let’s just say I go
into details in the Author’s Note, once you’ve read the story.
As for Phoebe, I knew I
wanted a scrappy writer on the rise, very much the classic fast-talking career
woman of 1940s films. I wanted to see what would happen when someone tough and
fearless, who had already seen so much, saw all her security stripped from her.
How would she begin to reclaim her life, let alone fight back?
Q: What kind of research did
you need to do to recreate New York and London in the 1950s?
A: So I’ve been lucky in that
I lived in New York for several years and I now live in London. Certain aspects
of both - like the architecture of Greenwich Village and that of London’s Soho
haven’t changed.
As for the people and the
world, I spent a lot of time in libraries, reading as many first-hand accounts
of daily life as an artist in what were then bohemian hubs. Life wasn’t easy, but
it was hard not to feel some nostalgia for it. People describe a fun,
close-knit world full of music, coffee, and constant chat. Danger, but also
excitement. You can see why it was all so inspiring for so many artists.
Q: What do you see as the
legacy of this period today?
A: It really depends on whom
you talk to. For many in the artistic world, there is still anger and
resentment about the targeting, the destruction of lives and careers. It’s only
recently that a lot of scripts written under pseudonyms have begun to have the
names of the blacklisted writers who penned them properly attached.
However, many people know
almost nothing about the era or what happened. So though my main goal was of
course to tell an exciting and entertaining story, with complex and interesting
women and their relationships as the focal point, I did also hope to raise some
awareness. Because this is the sort of thing that could happen again at an
official level.
Equally, it is something we
can fight. And I do think one of the lessons is that although in the immediate
a lot of people were cowed and crushed, along came the 1960s and the fight for
civil rights that ultimately saw huge societal change. The status quo will
always push back at a challenge, but I don’t think a world can remain so wholly
unequal forever.
Q: What are you working on
now?
A: I’m keeping to the 1950s
for a bit, focusing on young women who grew up during the war, watching their
mothers be lauded for taking jobs, but now forced back into the home, creating
confusion for their daughters. Society is telling them to be traditional, but
they’ve mostly just seen women as workers.
So who are they? What are
they going to do? It’s an interesting conundrum and one I look forward to
bringing to life.
Q: Anything else we should
know?
A: Though we’ve discussed the
political aspect of the story, Red Letter Days is ultimately a story about two
women forging their way in a world stacked against them. It’s available as an
ebook and audio book, as well as trade paper, and I encourage anyone who buys
it to do so from an independent book dealer.
I am happy to talk to book
clubs if interested - anyone can be in touch via my website: www.sarahjanestratford.com. Thank you so much!
--Interview with Deborah Kalb
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