And that was one book given me by another woman who thought I might be interested in reading it. I have no words to imitate. How can one imitate what the world expects her to imitate? The writer the world has put upon a pedestal is not the writer in my heart: God is the only true writer in my heart. Now those are words that cannot be imitated. Those are words that should be put upon a pedestal. Not mine or any other born unto man. It is such an unfair ruling to choose one great story or one great writer and blueprint that particular writer's work as the drum that every writer born thereafter must appeal to or mimic. I cannot help the year I was born. I cannot help that I have no idols. If I had been born before Faulkner or the other writers I am compared to, then they would be where I am. They came first, were born first. I came later and now, because I am gifted, I must be compared to the blue print. Why can't I have my own gift? Why cant it be mine without comparison? I have a rule, that rule is not to read other books of fiction while I'm writing, only autobiographical books and those books of fiction I read in college. I've got words stocked from the womb and I am about 30 years late in executing them. With all these years of waiting, all this buildup of words, I don't need to imitate. The words have been there and belong only to the characters in my mind. They are late coming, but they are emerging and they carry no blue print to push them along.
Dee: Can we agree that the Lord has something for us to say and apparently we haven't said it enough, so it has come back again? Or is that just my crazy talk?
Olympia: Yes, God gives us all something to say. The choice is ours. The choice is up to the person. You can either use the gift that you are given or let it buildup in your mind and soul and never be used. I often wonder where unused gifts go, if they lend themselves to your children after you are dead or they die with you in your grave. God has something for me to say, for the characters I write to say, and I am only executing that love through the characters and their lives.
The copyright of the article Finding Logic: An Interview with Olympia Vernon - Page 3 in African-American Women Writers is owned by . Permission to republish Finding Logic: An Interview with Olympia Vernon - Page 3 in print or online must be granted by the author in writing.
