Authors At Home: Jon Clinch “The General and Julia”
Today on Authors At Home, we’re featuring Jon Clinch. Jon Clinch is the author of the acclaimed novels Finn, Kings of the Earth, The Thief of Auschwitz, Belzoni Dreams of Egypt, Marley, and The General and Julia.
The General and Julia is a masterful portrait of an American Hero, General Ulysses S. Grant. Jon peels back the layers and presents an unfiltered look at the legacy and life of our 18th President. In this interview, find out what Jon was surprised to learn from his research of Grant and what inspired him to write about this towering figure in the first place. The book is on sale now so be sure to also get the book at your local bookstore or library!
What was it about Grant that made you want to write about him and his family? What inspired you to write a fictional account?
I saw his final year — in particular, his final month — as an act of heroism far more telling and evocative than the things most of us know about him from the Civil War. Having lost his money, his standing, and his health, he undertook the impossible to preserve his family’s well-being after his death ground. It seemed to me that a person with the character to accomplish what he did would be worth looking at very closely.
Would you have done what Grant did in his situation when it came to losing his finances?
I’d like to think so — wouldn’t we all? — but I doubt that I would have the power or the will to pull it off. It took a titanic effort.
There have been many fantastic reviews of THE GENERAL AND JULIA from trade publications and other authors. Is there anything that hasn’t been noted in the reviews that you hoped readers would take away from the book?
Nothing in particular, really — although I’m particularly glad when a reader notes that The General and Julia is, above all, a love story. Not a romance, a love story. The whole novel is driven by one man’s love for his wife, his children and grandchildren, his country, his fellow Americans, his fellow soldiers, and so on. If I’ve conveyed that, I’ve made a good start.
Was it difficult to write dialogue or scenes based on historical information? How did you fill in the blanks when historical record wasn’t enough?
The novelist’s job is to bring events and characters to life, and sometimes the more you detail know the less you let your imagination work. It’s all about consistency of vision and style. While writing Marley, I tried to create one scene where every bit of dialog was taken from Dickens’s original text — it didn’t fit with the tone of the rest of the book, and so it failed miserably. I had to scrap it and do it my own way.
Was there any information that came up in your research on General Grant that you found surprising or didn’t expect?
Ulysses Grant was our only sitting president to be arrested while in office. (He and some friends were apprehended racing their carriages along the streets of Washington — twice. He paid his fine without complaint.)
About the Book:
From the acclaimed author of Marley and Finn, a novel both intimate and epic capturing Ulysses S. Grant during his final days as he reflects on his life and reckons with his complicated legacy.
Once hailed as the Savior of the Union, he was the General who secured Robert E. Lee’s surrender at Appomattox. He was elected President of the United States twice and fought fiercely to protect the civil rights of African Americans and thwart the rise of the Ku Klux Klan. He had also been an impoverished farmer, a failed tycoon, and a devoted husband to Julia, a Southerner whose family owned slaves up to the end of the Civil War. Now barely able to walk or talk, with cancer metastasizing in his throat, Ulysses S. Grant is feverishly working to finish writing his memoirs before he dies in the hopes of providing his family with a modicum of financial security and redeeming himself in the annals of history.
Moving from blood-stained battlefields to Gilded Age New York, the novel explores how Grant’s own views on race and Reconstruction changed over time. Another work of “must-read modern literature” (Charles Frazier, New York Times bestselling author) from historical fiction master Jon Clinch, this evocatively crafted novel breathes fresh life into an American icon.
About Jon Clinch:
Jon Clinch is the author of the acclaimed novels Finn, Kings of the Earth, The Thief of Auschwitz, Belzoni Dreams of Egypt, Marley, and The General and Julia. A native of upstate New York, Jon lives with his wife in the Green Mountains of Vermont.
Jon has also lectured and taught widely, in settings as varied as the National Council of Teachers of English, Duke University, the Mark Twain House and Museum, and the Pennsylvania State University. In 2008 he organized a benefit reading for the financially ailing Twain House, enlisting such authors as Tom Perrotta, Elizabeth Letts, and Arthur Phillips for an event that saved the house from imminent bankruptcy. It’s probably the most important work he’s ever done.
