The Paris Review: Q&A with Andrea Barrett

INTERVIEWER

So how do you think you became what you are? Do you think it was innate?

BARRETT

That’s a big question: what is learned versus what is inherited. Nobody in my family does what I do, so who would I have inherited it from? On the other hand, no one taught me to love reading and writing when I was young, so how could I have learned it? Reading feels like something I was born loving. When we lived in Natick, before we moved to the Cape, the Bookmobile would visit our street once a week. I would be starved for that visit all week long, and I’d strip the shelves when it arrived. One driver allowed the children to take books from whatever shelves they could reach, and since I’ve always been tall, I could reach the highest shelf, where all the adult books were, at a pretty young age. That worked well for me.

(Source: theparisreview.org)