This transcript was automatically generated and might contain errors.

[0:10] Susan Blackwell: When I bump into something that inspires me, I jump in my spark file.

[0:18] Laura Camien: Spark file to be something that I wanna make or how I wanna be.

[0:23] Susan Blackwell: I pump it in my spark style. Spark!

[0:28] Laura Camien: I jump into my spark slide.

[0:32] Susan Blackwell: Let's open up the spark file.

[0:36] Laura Camien: Hey!

[0:38] Susan Blackwell: Welcome to the Sparks File where we believe that everyone is creative, but smart creative people don't go it alone.

[0:45] Laura Camien: I'm Laura Camien.

[0:46] Susan Blackwell: And I'm Susan Blackwell, and we are creativity coaches who help people fear less, create more, and bring their creative visions to life.

[0:54] Laura Camien: If you're an OG member of the Sparks File community, welcome back, Sparkler.

[0:58] Susan Blackwell: If you're joining us for the first time, hi, welcome, friend.

[1:02] Laura Camien: Know that just by listening to this podcast, you're joining a warm and wonderful clan of creatives.

[1:08] Susan Blackwell: But you may be asking yourself, what exactly is a spark file?

[1:08] Laura Camien: A spark file is a place where you consistently collect all of your inspirations and fascinations.

[1:18] Susan Blackwell: If you're like us and you're making stuff all the time, or you want to be making stuff all the time, you know, if you're not careful, your campfire of creativity can flicker out.

[1:27] Laura Camien: But don't despair.

[1:28] Susan Blackwell: We're collecting kindling in the form of fresh ideas, images, and inspiration that spark creativity and pique curiosity.

[1:36] Laura Camien: To light a fire under our collective asses to make things like this podcast.

[1:43] Susan Blackwell: Or a piece of creative self-expression about or from destruction.

[1:50] Laura Camien: Ooh.

[1:51] Susan Blackwell: Every episode, we're gonna reach into our spark files and exchange some sparks.

[1:55] Laura Camien: And from time to time, we're gonna talk to some folks who spark us as well.

[1:59] Susan Blackwell: You know what that means, Laura?

[2:01] Laura Camien: That means we have more sparks than we can possibly use in this lifetime.

[2:04] Susan Blackwell: It sure does.

[2:06] Laura Camien: So if something lights you up, we encourage you to take that thing and make something out of it.

[2:11] Susan Blackwell: So without further ado, let's open up the Sparks Spark by Laura Camien!

[2:19] Laura Camien: Susie Q.

[2:20] Susan Blackwell: How are you doing over there, Laura Camien?

[2:22] Laura Camien: I'm doing good.

[2:23] Susan Blackwell: I'm doing good.

[2:24] Laura Camien: We are well into fall.

[2:26] Susan Blackwell: And the weather is beautiful.

[2:28] Laura Camien: And like if I could live in this space for, you know, maybe 10 months out of the year, I'd be thrilled.

[2:35] Susan Blackwell: I know you do love fall, and I love it too.

[2:38] Laura Camien: And it's been, I'm sure by the time people are listening to this, they might be like shivering on in a snow drift.

[2:45] Susan Blackwell: Like, yeah, gray, mushy snow of it all, maybe, but I will say I think it's been is this true where you are?

[2:53] Laura Camien: It's been a beautiful autumn.

[2:54] Susan Blackwell: Has it been true?

[2:55] Laura Camien: True exquisite.

[2:56] Susan Blackwell: Ah.

[2:57] Laura Camien: Truly exquisite.

[2:59] Susan Blackwell: I think it was yesterday morning.

[3:00] Laura Camien: I looked out the window and I was like, oh, look at that.

[3:03] Susan Blackwell: All not all the leaves, but most of the leaves had finally dropped.

[3:08] Laura Camien: And we're to the season the season that we call brown sticks.

[3:12] Susan Blackwell: Brown sticks is after autumn but before winter.

[3:17] Laura Camien: Brownstick season.

[3:18] Susan Blackwell: It's brownstick season.

[3:20] Laura Camien: But I it's a unseasonably warm day today, the day we're recording this.

[3:26] Susan Blackwell: And I am just so thankful for the fall that we've had.

[3:31] Laura Camien: It's been beautiful.

[3:32] Susan Blackwell: Same.

[3:33] Laura Camien: Me too.

[3:35] Susan Blackwell: You know what else is good in life?

[3:37] Laura Camien: There's so much that is just oh god forsaken shit show.

[3:41] Susan Blackwell: But you know what is good?

[3:42] Laura Camien: What?

[3:43] Susan Blackwell: I'm gonna tell you.

[3:45] Laura Camien: There's a few things that are good.

[3:46] Susan Blackwell: Okay, tell me what.

[3:47] Laura Camien: One thing that is good is we had we had a Blaze class session today where people were doing creativity shares.

[3:57] Susan Blackwell: We had an Ignite class session today where people were learning about creativity shares in the Sparks File feedback process.

[4:03] Laura Camien: And I have to say, those two classes and the people in those classes were so fucking great.

[4:09] Susan Blackwell: They lit you up, didn't they?

[4:11] Laura Camien: And they lit my pants on fire.

[4:14] Susan Blackwell: I have to say as well.

[4:16] Laura Camien: It's oh I just feel so um I feel grateful.

[4:20] Susan Blackwell: It is inspiring and um random thing.

[4:24] Laura Camien: I really hate when I quote like some tile that I saw on Instagram, but I'm gonna do it.

[4:30] Susan Blackwell: Do it quote that meme.

[4:31] Laura Camien: In fairness, I think it was Deepak Chopra's, I think, but it was something along the lines of like imagine if you woke up tomorrow and all you had were the things you were grateful for today.

[4:46] Susan Blackwell: Oh my god, just got super clear for me.

[4:51] Laura Camien: Do you know what I mean?

[4:52] Susan Blackwell: And and uh you just looking around and being like, I'm grateful for you.

[4:55] Laura Camien: I'm grateful for this.

[4:56] Susan Blackwell: I'm grateful for this.

[4:58] Laura Camien: That is an interesting exercise.

[5:00] Susan Blackwell: It really truly is, and I do gratitude stuff every day, but it did make me expand a little bit of like Laura.

[5:09] Laura Camien: Oh, yeah, and I'm grateful for this, and I'm grateful.

[5:12] Susan Blackwell: Yeah, Laura.

[5:14] Laura Camien: It might be an Instagram meme tile, but I have to say I've never heard that before.

[5:19] Susan Blackwell: It's powerful.

[5:20] Laura Camien: It is, and it makes me think of it makes me think of my spark today.

[5:24] Susan Blackwell: Oh in a second, and it also makes me think of the other day in uh I attend this gym.

[5:31] Laura Camien: I think I've talked about it on the podcast before, Mark Fisher Fitness.

[5:35] Susan Blackwell: It's live classes that they teach virtually over Zoom so that I can live wherever I want to live and I can still zoom on in and get my fitness on with a group of people whom I adore.

[5:50] Laura Camien: Love Mark Fisher Fitness, love the instructors, love the community there.

[5:54] Susan Blackwell: And our beloved fitness teacher, Chris Cruthers, who I've talked about on the podcast before because he's written a uh Haiku every day for like 10 years.

[6:05] Laura Camien: Yes.

[6:05] Susan Blackwell: Chris Cruthers has been training to run the New York Marathon, which is happening tomorrow.

[6:12] Laura Camien: And the day before yesterday, he had an appendicitis attack and had to have emergency surgery.

[6:20] Susan Blackwell: So he was it was like no marathon for you.

[6:24] Laura Camien: Oh but for the name game in our class, we always do a name game as we do with the Sparks File.

[6:29] Susan Blackwell: We call it a Sparks round.

[6:30] Laura Camien: But for the name game, each person said something that they were grateful for.

[6:35] Susan Blackwell: And I just want to say, Chris Cruthers, I'm grateful for modern medicine.

[6:40] Laura Camien: It's not yieldie pioneer times, and you will live to run another day because you could have good health care and you have health insurance.

[6:50] Susan Blackwell: I'm grateful for that too.

[6:51] Laura Camien: Yes.

[6:51] Susan Blackwell: And I'm grateful for I'm just grateful for you, Chris Cruthers.

[6:54] Laura Camien: But that gratitude game, I'm telling you, sometimes I'll make people in my life, Laura and I sometimes play this game where if we're having kind of a shite day, I'll be like, can we do the gratitude game?

[7:07] Susan Blackwell: We haven't done it in a minute, but I do like the gratitude game.

[7:10] Laura Camien: I I'll do it with Wes too.

[7:12] Susan Blackwell: Like, I'll just be like, babe, let me tell you this thing I saw on Instagram, and let's talk about let's talk about all the things we're grateful for.

[7:20] Laura Camien: Yeah.

[7:21] Susan Blackwell: In the same way that worry is not insurance against bad things happening, gratitude isn't insurance against it either.

[7:28] Laura Camien: But I do think that habituating gratitude does change your thoughts and therefore the chemical response to your body and your feelings.

[7:36] Susan Blackwell: And it I do think I don't know, it makes life feel better.

[7:40] Laura Camien: And I have to believe that it contributes just the general sense of well-being.

[7:45] Susan Blackwell: Um, sure.

[7:46] Laura Camien: I feel like it does give you like the shot of dopamine when you think about all those things that you love and you're, you know, thankful for.

[7:53] Susan Blackwell: I also think about I'm gonna, I don't remember the name of the of the woman who wrote about it.

[7:59] Laura Camien: I think then Oprah talked about it, but I don't think it was Oprah who we referenced first time.

[8:04] Susan Blackwell: But the concept of um when you can get grateful for things in your life when everything's going well.

[8:10] Laura Camien: Yes, you can exercise the muscle so that when things are not going well, you had talked about somebody like living through like a hurricane or a tornado.

[8:21] Susan Blackwell: That's right.

[8:22] Laura Camien: And how if you've practiced that gratitude, if you have a real gratitude practice in place, this is making me think I've I feel like I've fallen off my more like formal daily gratitude practice.

[8:36] Susan Blackwell: And I could stand to get back into it, but I also think it's fun to play that gratitude game more frequently.

[8:42] Laura Camien: It's great anytime.

[8:43] Susan Blackwell: It's like stop, drop and roll, right?

[8:45] Laura Camien: Just stop drop and gratitude.

[8:48] Susan Blackwell: Stop drop and gratitude.

[8:49] Laura Camien: And it's if you're like, I'm telling you, like if you're not in a great mood, you play that gratitude game, this change will come over you.

[8:58] Susan Blackwell: It will, it'll reset your day.

[9:00] Laura Camien: Yeah.

[9:00] Susan Blackwell: Laura, say something you're grateful for.

[9:03] Laura Camien: I'm grateful for the life that um Wes and I have co-created together, and the life that you and I have co-created together, Suze.

[9:14] Susan Blackwell: Bah.

[9:15] Laura Camien: Yeah.

[9:15] Susan Blackwell: I love that.

[9:16] Laura Camien: How about you?

[9:18] Susan Blackwell: I'm gonna say I am grateful for people in my life.

[9:25] Laura Camien: There are several who can hang in through tough times and even conflict.

[9:34] Susan Blackwell: I'm grateful for that.

[9:35] Laura Camien: Because it's not for the faint of heart.

[9:37] Susan Blackwell: It's not for the faint of heart, but it is so worth it when you do the work.

[9:42] Laura Camien: Yeah.

[9:43] Susan Blackwell: Now, listener, sparkler, what are you grateful for?

[9:46] Laura Camien: Just take a second.

[9:47] Susan Blackwell: We'll give you a little moment of quiet.

[9:49] Laura Camien: Here you go.

[9:50] Susan Blackwell: Um, say out loud something you're grateful for.

[9:59] Laura Camien: Nice.

[9:59] Susan Blackwell: It's a good one.

[10:01] Laura Camien: Well done.

[10:01] Susan Blackwell: Well done, Sparkler.

[10:03] Laura Camien: Susan Blackwell, may I interest you in a fresh spark?

[10:07] Susan Blackwell: I'll take that spark.

[10:09] Laura Camien: I've got a spark for you, and I feel like it really does line up with some of the things we're talking about here.

[10:15] Susan Blackwell: In a way, we'll we'll get there.

[10:17] Laura Camien: Maybe a long way to grandma's house, but we'll get there.

[10:20] Susan Blackwell: So I'm excited about the Sparks.

[10:22] Laura Camien: My Sparks resources today include, of course, our friend Wikipedia, the University of Arkansas Clinton School of Public Service speaker series, a good housekeeping article for diversity, and some things that I'm gonna cite along the way.

[10:36] Susan Blackwell: No spoilers.

[10:38] Laura Camien: Cams.

[10:38] Susan Blackwell: Yeah, bam.

[10:39] Laura Camien: You know, I think I've talked about this on the podcast for several years.

[10:42] Susan Blackwell: I have partnered with the Metropolitan Opera on various projects.

[10:47] Laura Camien: That's right.

[10:47] Susan Blackwell: So let's be clear no one is asking me to sing at the Met.

[10:51] Laura Camien: Hey.

[10:51] Susan Blackwell: And I think they're the worst for it.

[10:53] Laura Camien: I really do.

[10:54] Susan Blackwell: I think you might be the outlying opinion, but hold on to it.

[10:58] Laura Camien: Um I love your faith in me.

[11:00] Susan Blackwell: Uh, what I do for the Met, happily, is that I conduct a lot of on camera on mic interviews for them, and I help educators, starting with myself, to understand opera better.

[11:12] Laura Camien: So I lead these conversations and conduct interviews around just various topics related to opera.

[11:18] Susan Blackwell: And we've even recorded an episode of the Sparks File podcast at the Metropolitan Opera.

[11:22] Laura Camien: Yes.

[11:23] Susan Blackwell: So go back and give it a listen.

[11:25] Laura Camien: Oh, that was so fun.

[11:26] Susan Blackwell: Laura, who knew opera could be so fascinating and rich in history and complicated and sometimes problematic, but it is it's deep.

[11:35] Laura Camien: I mean, anything that goes back that far is likely you are right.

[11:41] Susan Blackwell: I mean, likely to be problematic, but that is why we are recreating the world.

[11:47] Laura Camien: That's right.

[11:48] Susan Blackwell: So recently I'm moderating this conference at the Metropolitan Opera, and I feel like I won a contest because I had the good fortune of interviewing the great Irish actress Fiona Shaw.

[12:01] Laura Camien: Now, you may know Fiona Shaw from the Harry Potter movies.

[12:05] Susan Blackwell: She plays Harry's aunt, Petunia Dursley, who lodges him in a cupboard under the stairs.

[12:11] Laura Camien: Oh, could she?

[12:12] Susan Blackwell: How would she?

[12:14] Laura Camien: Um, I think I first became aware of Fiona Shaw in the movie My Left Foot, starring Daniel Day Lewis.

[12:21] Susan Blackwell: Laura, do you remember that movie?

[12:24] Laura Camien: I do.

[12:25] Susan Blackwell: Not the entire plot of it, but I do remember it.

[12:28] Susan Blackwell: Yeah. It's uh I went back and I rewatched the trailer when I was preparing the spark, and I was like, oh my God. Remember that. That was a two at the time.

[12:37] Laura Camien: Yeah, yeah.

[12:38] Susan Blackwell: He won the Oscar, right?

[12:40] Laura Camien: I think he won the Oscar for that.

[12:41] Susan Blackwell: That sounds right.

[12:42] Laura Camien: Yeah.

[12:43] Susan Blackwell: I'm gonna say that sounds right, but I'd have to do my research on it. It was an important film, as they say.

[12:49] Laura Camien: Well, his performances and hers, like the cast is great in that.

[12:53] Susan Blackwell: Yeah. For our younger listeners, Fiona Shaw stars on Killing Eve. If you watch that show, she was on Fleabag. Before all that, she was a leading lady at the Royal Shakespeare Company and the National Theater, and she continues to have this unfucking believable career.

[13:10] Laura Camien: In addition to being a great actress, Fiona Shaw is also she was a motherfucking genius.

[13:18] Susan Blackwell: I've interviewed her before, and I gotta tell you, I was I was just intimidated and a little anxious because interviewing her is like riding a really fast horse, and you just have to hold on.

[13:32] Laura Camien: Uh-huh.

[13:33] Susan Blackwell: And try like try not to fall off, try to keep up.

[13:36] Laura Camien: Yes.

[13:37] Susan Blackwell: Gent you're gently steering it, you want to stay on the road.

[13:39] Laura Camien: Yeah, but but sh her brain, she cognates quickly.

[13:43] Susan Blackwell: So I was that was a little quick cognition. She's really something, but she's also, in addition to being a great actress and a genius, she's an opera director.

[13:52] Laura Camien: Wow.

[13:53] Susan Blackwell: But the reason I was interviewing Fiona Shaw is because during the conference we were exploring the opera Medea.

[14:00] Laura Camien: Some might know that as Medea.

[14:02] Susan Blackwell: Medea. You say Medea, I say Medea.

[14:06] Laura Camien: Uh huh.

[14:06] Susan Blackwell: But Fiona Shaw is recognized as one of the greatest stage Medeias of our time.

[14:11] Laura Camien: Okay, can we just pause for one second?

[14:14] Susan Blackwell: Yes, of course.

[14:14] Laura Camien: Is the differentiation in pronunciation? Where does that come from? And is are both correct?

[14:22] Susan Blackwell: I think that you can call you can, it's dealer's choice. I noticed when I was talking to Fiona, and when I was talking to anybody about the opera, they all pronounced it Medea.

[14:36] Laura Camien: Uh-huh.

[14:36] Susan Blackwell: And I was like, I've spent my life calling it Medea. Medea. And so, but I heard I I think it's I'm going with you can use whatever pronunciation.

[14:47] Laura Camien: Okay.

[14:47] Susan Blackwell: Good to know.

[14:50] Laura Camien: Madea.

[14:51] Susan Blackwell: So Fiona Shaw is recognized as this great stage Medea.

[14:56] Laura Camien: And CamS, did you see that production of Medea slash Medea slash Tyler Perry's Medea?

[15:03] Susan Blackwell: Um, did you see that production of Medea that Fiona Shaw starred in on Broadway about 20 years ago?

[15:10] Laura Camien: I did not.

[15:11] Susan Blackwell: I know this is like a Yeoldy Sparky, but I did not.

[15:15] Laura Camien: I didn't see it either.

[15:16] Susan Blackwell: But she started this production of Medea, directed by her longtime collaborator, Deborah Warner, that played on the West End and on Broadway and at other theaters around that 2001, 2002 time.

[15:30] Laura Camien: So we were living in New York then.

[15:32] Susan Blackwell: Yeah.

[15:32] Laura Camien: But I don't know. Maybe I wasn't spending my money on um Broadway theater tickets.

[15:36] Susan Blackwell: Yeah. I didn't again did not see that production, but I knew that I needed a Fiona Shaw slash Medea crash course, and I needed it real fast before this interview.

[15:47] Laura Camien: So where did I turn ye oldie internet?

[15:51] Susan Blackwell: Yeah. Yes, girl. Cam's lucky me, I found a recording of that production, a sound recording that had been made into a BBC radio program directed by you guessed it, Fiona Shaw.

[16:07] Laura Camien: And then I found the translation of Medea by Frederick Raphael and Kenneth McLeish, the script that was actually used in that production.

[16:17] Susan Blackwell: Like I hit the Google Jackpot.

[16:19] Laura Camien: And this is the play, not the opera.

[16:23] Susan Blackwell: This is the play.

[16:23] Laura Camien: Right.

[16:24] Susan Blackwell: This is the play.

[16:25] Laura Camien: Got it.

[16:25] Susan Blackwell: I gotta tell you, I got so uh and I'll gonna unpack this in a second. I got so into this play that when she came to talk with me and these educators about Medea.

[16:40] Laura Camien: I was just like I'm gonna crawl right up in there.

[16:42] Susan Blackwell: I'm crawling up into this play and her performance of it, which was completely appropriate. But I mean, uh Laura Cammy.

[16:51] Laura Camien: How delicious, Laura.

[16:53] Susan Blackwell: This is when I feel like I slash we have won a contest. When it's like you see or you take in a great artist's work, and then you get to turn to them and be like, Can I ask you some questions?

[17:06] Laura Camien: I got questions.

[17:07] Susan Blackwell: Yes, it's awesome.

[17:10] Laura Camien: Holy moly.

[17:11] Susan Blackwell: So this Medea, including this production of the play, this translation, this recording, make up one part of my spark today, and that spark is creation about destruction.

[17:25] Laura Camien: Oh, interesting.

[17:27] Susan Blackwell: Creation about destruction. So you have may have heard me talk on this very podcast about the cycles of creation, maintenance, and destruction that are presented in the Vedas.

[17:38] Laura Camien: The Vedas are an ancient body of knowledge that is the foundation for things like acupuncture and feng shui and Ayurveda.

[17:45] Susan Blackwell: Yeah. Veda means knowledge, and specifically it's referring to the knowledge of nature.

[17:51] Laura Camien: The Vedas are the human interpretation of natural law.

[17:56] Susan Blackwell: And if you're a student of the, I learned all this from Emily Fletcher. If you're a student of the Vedas, it's all about getting in alignment with the flow of nature as opposed to rigidly working against nature's flow.

[18:08] Laura Camien: Yeah.

[18:08] Susan Blackwell: And as a result, if you're working against nature, it will pummel you against the rocks.

[18:13] Laura Camien: So in the Vedas, they talk about these cycles of creation, maintenance, and destruction.

[18:17] Susan Blackwell: And they're all necessary, they're all part of it.

[18:21] Laura Camien: But Emily Fletcher talks about how if you prefer, like if you get into a maintenance mode in any part of your life, just know the next thing that's going to happen is destruction.

[18:34] Susan Blackwell: If you're in maintenance, the next thing that's going to happen is destruction.

[18:38] Laura Camien: So you can proactively choose, though all of those things are a part of a natural life well lived and part of a creative process, I believe.

[18:46] Susan Blackwell: You can choose to habitually return to creation out of choice.

[18:52] Laura Camien: Can I just say this out loud so I understand?

[18:54] Susan Blackwell: Um like, for example, like in a relationship, like a loving relationship.

[18:59] Laura Camien: Yeah.

[19:00] Susan Blackwell: I'm gonna use the loving relationship that I have with West A.

[19:03] Laura Camien: Use it.

[19:04] Susan Blackwell: So what I want to avoid is coming to the place where, like, okay, it's done, it's complete, and now I'm just gonna keep it like this.

[19:11] Laura Camien: You got it.

[19:11] Susan Blackwell: But rather that we remain in a state of like we are co-creating this, you got every day, and we're choosing to be.

[19:18] Laura Camien: Okay.

[19:18] Susan Blackwell: This is awesome.

[19:19] Laura Camien: You got it.

[19:20] Susan Blackwell: And I think we've all been in relationships where we slip into maintenance.

[19:24] Laura Camien: Yes, yeah, and then get guess what comes next?

[19:27] Susan Blackwell: Yeah.

[19:27] Laura Camien: Destruction.

[19:29] Susan Blackwell: So and that may be the wick on that might be very long before you get to the destruction.

[19:39] Laura Camien: But you know.

[19:40] Susan Blackwell: Um, so today I want to talk about creation about destruction, which leads me back to Medea.

[19:50] Laura Camien: Cams, how much do you know about Medea?

[19:52] Susan Blackwell: And there is no shame in any amount of knowledge.

[19:57] Laura Camien: Um, if I recall, does she kill her own children in the play?

[20:02] Susan Blackwell: Yeah, she does.

[20:04] Laura Camien: So I remember spoilers on a play written in 431 BC. If you haven't read it by now, um it actually makes me think of do you remember when I talked about my friend Maria Santucci?

[20:18] Susan Blackwell: Yes, yes, there was a production of Medea done at our university that it was done the year before I arrived there.

[20:27] Laura Camien: And it was it legendary, legendary, and I believe it.

[20:32] Susan Blackwell: I believe that she is phenomenal in it.

[20:35] Laura Camien: Yeah, I mean, I can't compare her to Fiona Shaw, I don't know, but I can say that everything I know about Medea is from Maria Santucci.

[20:44] Susan Blackwell: I love that.

[20:45] Laura Camien: I love that.

[20:46] Susan Blackwell: So in a nutshell, if you don't, if you weren't able to talk to Fiona Shaw or like Laura, be close to the legend of Maria Santucci, let me share a little bit about Medea.

[20:58] Laura Camien: According to our friend Wikipedia, Medea was first performed again in 431 BC at the City Dionysia Festival, where every year three tragedians competed against each other, each writing a tetrology of three tragedies and a satyr play.

[21:16] Susan Blackwell: Like, can we stop for a second?

[21:18] Laura Camien: I've never heard the word tragedians.

[21:21] Susan Blackwell: Are there people who write tragedy?

[21:23] Laura Camien: Is that I think so.

[21:24] Susan Blackwell: Uh so that like maybe is like a term for an ancient Greek writer of tragedies.

[21:30] Laura Camien: Of tragedy.

[21:31] Susan Blackwell: A tragedian.

[21:32] Laura Camien: You never intersected with that in theater history classes.

[21:35] Susan Blackwell: Or if I did, it was one of those words my eyes skimmed right over because I kind of got the gist of it, but I never said it out loud.

[21:41] Laura Camien: Say it, say it with me.

[21:42] Susan Blackwell: Tragedian.

[21:44] Laura Camien: Tragedian.

[21:45] Susan Blackwell: Tragedian.

[21:46] Laura Camien: Tragedian.

[21:47] Susan Blackwell: I love that.

[21:48] Laura Camien: Laura, while I was at the Met conference, I heard a word I had never heard before.

[21:55] Susan Blackwell: And I was like, somebody like busted out this word, Antiphony.

[22:01] Laura Camien: And I was like, did you just in front of a whole like a group of a hundred people?

[22:06] Susan Blackwell: I was like, did you just say Antiphony? And I was like, we're gonna have to just pause for a second and teach, teach Auntie Susan what Antiphony means.

[22:15] Laura Camien: And this educator took the time to teach me what it means.

[22:20] Susan Blackwell: Which I was like, I used to be so shy and ashamed when I heard a word that I didn't understand what it meant, or I didn't know how to pronounce it, or I mispronounced it.

[22:32] Laura Camien: I would just because I'd only read it, and I would, and I've just given that up.

[22:36] Susan Blackwell: Like absolutely.

[22:38] Laura Camien: I'm like, so yeah, let's let's hear it for a tragedian and let's hear it for Antiphony.

[22:43] Susan Blackwell: I feel like you like follow behind me, picking up like words mispronounced and be like, um, Laura, you drop this.

[22:50] Laura Camien: This is not this word.

[22:52] Susan Blackwell: Say it, say it the right way.

[22:54] Laura Camien: Like I learn all the time from because I'm just sort of like, I'll just take a run at it.

[22:59] Susan Blackwell: And um I love that about you.

[23:01] Laura Camien: There's a word that I heard somebody say it recently, and I was like, I think it's an often misunderstood or misused word, which is penultimate.

[23:12] Susan Blackwell: Penultimate.

[23:13] Laura Camien: Penultimate, meaning the one before the final one, as opposed to the ultimate ultimate.

[23:13] Susan Blackwell: The ultimate.

[23:22] Laura Camien: At penultimate, but I heard somebody say we use it as the ultimate all the time, though, right?

[23:26] Susan Blackwell: I think it means the one before the final one.

[23:29] Laura Camien: Laura.

[23:32] Susan Blackwell: Penultimate.

[23:33] Laura Camien: But I I'm like, teach me, school me.

[23:35] Susan Blackwell: Yeah, I want to learn.

[23:37] Laura Camien: I'm sure I would have pronounced it antiphony if if I had been left to my own devices.

[23:41] Susan Blackwell: If you saw it on paper, yeah.

[23:43] Laura Camien: Um yeah.

[23:44] Susan Blackwell: I want you to repeat that sentence that you just said, because there were some golden words in that.

[23:51] Laura Camien: Here we go. Medea was first performed 431 BC at the City Dionysia Festival.

[23:58] Susan Blackwell: I just love that there was a city Dionysia Festival.

[24:01] Laura Camien: Here every year, three tragedians competed against each other, each writing a tetrology of three tragedies and a satyr play.

[24:13] Susan Blackwell: That's amazing.

[24:14] Laura Camien: That is just like an amazing assemblage of five dollar theater history words right there.

[24:19] Susan Blackwell: Oh wow.

[24:21] Laura Camien: I think they could have thrown in Catherine, they could have thrown in Cyclorama.

[24:26] Susan Blackwell: Like there's so many words we didn't get to use in that sentence.

[24:29] Laura Camien: They stopped that sentence a little short.

[24:31] Susan Blackwell: So just so you know, in 431 BC, this is the stiff competition that was running at the City Dionysia Festival.

[24:39] Laura Camien: Amazing.

[24:40] Susan Blackwell: The competing playwrights were Euphorion, who is the son of the famed playwright Aeschylus, Sophocles, who was Euripides' main rival, and our man Euripides, who wrote Medea.

[24:56] Susan Blackwell: Just so you know, Euphorion won and Euripides placed last.

[25:01] Laura Camien: Mwah.

[25:04] Susan Blackwell: Wow.

[25:05] Laura Camien: But you know what? It's so interesting because I mean, I don't know everything, but I've seen and I've read and I've studied a lot of theater. I've never heard of Euphorion, but I know Euripides.

[25:17] Susan Blackwell: Yeah.

[25:18] Laura Camien: I'm curious. I wonder what, I wonder why. Who lives? Who dies? Who does this? Who tells your story?

[25:24] Susan Blackwell: Well, Euripides, I have to say, I think it was speculated, if I understand this correctly, and again, I'm not a theater historian. I'm just a girl who can read Wikipedia. But Euripides placed last, and it may have been because this Medea, you gave us a play we were not asking for it. We weren't prepared for this.

[25:43] Laura Camien: Yes, yes, yes, yes.

[25:45] Susan Blackwell: Um, so let's talk a little bit about the plot. The story of Medea is based on the myth of Jason and Medea, who are like a Bonnie and Clyde. They are like madly in love, they're totally hot, and they're totally hot for each other. And they are tearing around the world. Jason wants the golden fleece. And I think the golden fleece is literally the fleece of some mythic creature, but I think it's a representation of great wealth and a symbol of authority and kingship. But we'll just call it the golden fleece for short.

[26:23] Laura Camien: Yeah.

[26:23] Susan Blackwell: And so he wants that golden fleece, and he is on a boat called the Argos with his Argonauts. And he and Medea are tearing around the world on this boat. She's working her witchy ways, trying to get that golden fleece for him. But in pursuing this, they essentially leave scorched earth and burnt bridges and dead bodies everywhere they go. So if Jason and Medea have been there, bodies have hit the floor or the water, as the case may be.

[26:55] Laura Camien: It is, I mean, it is a rip roaring.

[26:59] Susan Blackwell: Because they have supernatural powers, like they're godlike powers, or they have an argument. It says repeatedly.

[27:06] Laura Camien: Well, they have all these Argonauts, which are these, uh, the I guess the sailors on the boat Argos.

[27:11] Susan Blackwell: I never knew that. I thought like an Argonaut was like an astronaut. Do you remember Jason of the Argonauts, that movie, that claymation movie where he fights skeletons in a sword fight?

[27:20] Laura Camien: I don't know why I didn't know what an Argonaut was until about two days ago.

[27:24] Susan Blackwell: And then you bet. I'm learning right now.

[27:27] Laura Camien: Right.

[27:27] Susan Blackwell: Add that to our list of the oldy dusty words. So she likes to say over and over again, my father's father, the son. So she is literally descended from the motherfucking son.

[27:42] Laura Camien: Wow, that's some pedigree.

[27:43] Susan Blackwell: But you know what I take away from that? If your father's father is the son, that shit will make you crazy.

[27:50] Laura Camien: Crazy.

[27:51] Susan Blackwell: It's too much. It's too much. It's too much heat. So, Laura, the things that that couple did, this is all story, this is all myth. But like the things in the stories are crazy.

[28:06] Laura Camien: Crazy.

[28:07] Susan Blackwell: From the myths. The myths that transpired before 491 BC. I think this is coming from the myths. I don't think that her father's father was the son. I don't even know if these people, I don't think they actually lived. I think these are myths, right?

[28:24] Laura Camien: Yeah.

[28:25] Susan Blackwell: But this is where like that you're really reaching the edges of my theater history knowledge, Laura.

[28:29] Laura Camien: Okay, hey, listen.

[28:31] Susan Blackwell: But and Greek mythology. But I do think it's all born out of myth.

[28:35] Laura Camien: Yeah.

[28:35] Susan Blackwell: But all suffice it to say, these two, they're hot, they're hot for each other, they're destructive as hell, and they have burnt, like, there's nowhere else for them to go. They are essentially now immigrants in Corinth, and everyone everywhere else hates them.

[28:53] Laura Camien: Jason could be described as a, the Fiona Shaw described him. They conceptualized him in their production as sort of like a David Beckham, just like fucking hot, but just like a status seeker. And Jason, who he and Medea have had this hot, hot, hot, hot, hot relationship. He falls for the princess of Corinth and plans to leave Medea and their two sons in order to marry that princess and secure. Like he tries to spin it a bunch of different ways. Like that he's doing it for them.

[29:23] Susan Blackwell: Medea does not seem like somebody that you leave. She's not someone you fuck with, Laura. Fuck around and find out. Should be on a t-shirt that Medea wears.

[29:35] Susan Blackwell: So imagine she's like got all these powers. My father's father, the son, she's a little bit cray. And with her broken, angry heart, Medea starts to figure out how she can inflict maximum pain and heartbreak for the pain that she's experiencing. I couldn't remember why she kills her kids, and now it's all clear. She was super mad at him.

[30:01] Laura Camien: Ugh.

[30:02] Susan Blackwell: And then the play, like she's figuring out how to exact maximum pain, and then she starts killing people. So again, spoilers for a play that was written in 431 BC, but it's just like the king, his daughter, the princess, whom Jason loves. And then honestly, even though we know how it turns out, shockingly, her two sons.

[30:26] Laura Camien: So, you know, when I'm doing when I'm preparing, before I really crack into research for this interview, I'm thinking 431 BC Cam, Euripides, even with all that action, this has got to be one dusty old play.

[30:41] Laura Camien: Oh.

[30:42] Susan Blackwell: And then I hear this recording of Fiona Shaw and this great company of actors interpreting the story in such a raw human way. And came in comma space, Laura. I was all holy fucking shit. You literally hear this.

[31:03] Laura Camien: Oh my God.

[31:05] Susan Blackwell: It just this out of control human, this runaway train, this person who has victimized so many, who is like the ultimate open wound victim. Yeah, considering what would be the most destructive path that I, this runaway train could take. And throughout calibrating the plan to amp up the destruction even more. And the performances are so raw and so human and so nuanced. It is bananas. And then lucky me, again, I got to turn and talk to Fiona Shaw about all of this. I mean, really. Come on. What a gift. What is this life?

[31:44] Laura Camien: So Fiona Shaw told me that she felt like she was like, I really feel like we've got to the bottom of that piece. And I was like, you think Fiona Shaw? Because they understood it in such a deep, nuanced way because they had spent so much time on it. And again, we really do believe creating things of quality really can take a lot of time. But because they took that time, I could understand it from the jump.

[32:08] Susan Blackwell: Yes.

[32:09] Laura Camien: Yes.

[32:10] Susan Blackwell: So you know how sometimes you go to you see like a classical play or a Shakespearean play, and it takes a little bit before you slip into the groove of the language.

[32:20] Laura Camien: Uh-huh.

[32:21] Susan Blackwell: Yep. Killer Came, this play is clear from the jump.

[32:27] Laura Camien: Wow.

[32:28] Susan Blackwell: There is no waiting for it to kick in. Like it kicks in from the top. So Fiona told me that the two guys who did the translation were two teachers. And one of the things that struck me is that they use really clear language, penny words throughout. There's not big fancy SAT words. They're just these lovely penny words, which contributes to it being so accessible. And if I understand my theater history correctly, that would be in keeping with the time that the play was originally written in the Greek. That it wasn't, you know, this big, impenetrable, difficult to understand language.

[33:10] Laura Camien: Well, yeah. I mean, it's taking place like at a city festival.

[33:14] Susan Blackwell: Yeah.

[33:15] Laura Camien: Um, in a competition with other plays.

[33:18] Susan Blackwell: Yeah, that makes total sense.

[33:19] Laura Camien: Yeah.

[33:20] Susan Blackwell: But I love that. I just, I love this play so much. Laura, I've been holding this in, waiting to deliver the spark because we wondered because we talked a little bit about how great it was to talk with Fiona Shaw, but you know you and I we would normally like unpack. And I was like you held these cards close.

[33:37] Laura Camien: That's right.

[33:41] Susan Blackwell: I was saving it for this moment. You know, I said this to Fiona and to the audience there, but it felt so contemporary, Laura, it almost felt like true crime if that makes sense.

[33:53] Laura Camien: Wow.

[33:54] Susan Blackwell: Well yeah it's so interesting. You know you and I were talking literally just the other day about a woman who true fact killed her children recently like in the past year. It having to do with like a belief of um some conspiracy theories and yeah it's still shock it's shocking now it's shocking then it's shocking now when you read a story for any for any reason how and why someone could do that.

[34:21] Laura Camien: Yeah it seemed very very contemporary.

[34:24] Susan Blackwell: Another thing that I it's so funny when I do these interviews sometimes I'm just like another thing I like about what you did is but one of the things I told Fiona professional I make up for my lack of professionalism with enthusiasm. I told Fiona that documentary I've said this to you Laura it's one of my favorite forms because you cannot beat like you cannot beat it for nuance sometimes you see stuff in a documentary and you're like you can't make that up you can't but because of the work that they had done to get to the bottom of the piece and because of the company's performing skills led by Fiona Shaw and directed by Deborah Warner, it is so endlessly nuanced. It really was as enjoyable for me as a documentary.

[35:06] Laura Camien: Wow.

[35:07] Susan Blackwell: So I'm telling you all of this because I was so sparked by this piece. And I've got a little present for all you sparkly listeners. I have created a hidden page on our website. So if you go to thesparkfile.com/slash M E D E A, I have posted the BBC radio production of Medea, directed by and starring Fiona Shaw. And the translation by Frederick Raphael and Kenneth McCleche. So if you like theater or true crime or blumhouse horror movies or just really high quality shit, I recommend you carve out 75 minutes and go get your Euripides on.

[35:48] Laura Camien: No way.

[35:49] Susan Blackwell: Way.

[35:50] Laura Camien: Laura, it's so good.

[35:53] Susan Blackwell: Sneaking around, making hidden website pages.

[35:57] Laura Camien: I think it's so good.

[35:58] Susan Blackwell: Now, if you listen to it and you're like, Blackwell. No, I know it's gonna be incredible.

[36:03] Laura Camien: I loved it.

[36:04] Susan Blackwell: I've listened to it. I'm not even kidding. I think I've probably listened to it three or four times.

[36:10] Laura Camien: Wow.

[36:12] Susan Blackwell: But it's a real pleasure to listen to it and read along.

[36:15] Laura Camien: Yeah.

[36:16] Susan Blackwell: Like you're sort of like, I fully grasp the depth and the dimension of Medea written in 431 BC.

[36:24] Laura Camien: Wow.

[36:25] Susan Blackwell: Yeah. So this spark is actually a twofer though, Laura.

[36:28] Laura Camien: Okay.

[36:29] Susan Blackwell: What else you got?

[36:29] Laura Camien: I'll tell you what else I got. My friend Ashley Van Buren. Hi, Ashley.

[36:33] Susan Blackwell: Ashley.

[36:34] Laura Camien: Hi.

[36:35] Susan Blackwell: Ashley saw on somebody's social media, God knows it wasn't mine, that I was interviewing Fiona Shaw at the Met, and she left me this message saying, Oh my god, Fiona Shaw, that's so cool. But you know who's really cool? Fiona Shaw's wife. Her memoir is one of my favorite books. And you know, I'm always down to clown with a good spark.

[36:51] Laura Camien: You're kidding me.

[36:52] Susan Blackwell: So I got a copy of that book that Ashley recommended. And that was written by a woman named Sonali Deraniyagala. Sonali Deraniyagala is a Sri Lankan economist. And that book is called Wave. Laura Camien, are you familiar with a book called Wave?

[37:11] Laura Camien: Suzai and Don't look it up. Don't look it up.

[37:12] Susan Blackwell: No, I'm not. I'm just leaning forward towards it.

[37:16] Laura Camien: Okay.

[37:16] Susan Blackwell: I don't know. I didn't mean to be that. I didn't mean to be that aggressive. That was awfully sharp. I know. Jesus Christ. I just want to maintain a little mystique.

[37:26] Laura Camien: So Sonali was born in Sri Lanka and she studied economics at Cambridge and has her doctorate from Oxford.

[37:35] Susan Blackwell: Fancy.

[37:36] Laura Camien: When Sonali was 18 years old and an undergrad at Cambridge, she met Steve Lissenberg, and they eventually married and gave birth to two boys, Vikram and Molly. In December of 2004, when the boys were five and seven, the whole family, including Sonali, her two sons, her husband, her parents, her good friend Orlantha and Orlantha's parents were on Christmas vacation at a hotel in Sri Lanka's Yala National Park. And the day after Christmas, they were packing up to leave within the hour, and her husband was in the bathroom, and the boys were jumping up and down on their beds, playing with their Christmas presents. And she's chatting with her friend. And her friend was saying, I want what you have.

What you have is a dream. Oh God. And Sonali had her back to the windows, and then her friend Orlantha, who was facing the windows that looked out at the ocean, said, Look at the ocean, which is usually a flat line miles in the distance, but it was especially foamy, and it seemed to be coming closer. Oh no. And Sonali called to her husband to come look at something odd. And what they were seeing was a tsunami hitting the coast where their hotel was located, a tsunami of epic scale that took an estimated 230,000 lives across a dozen countries. And within the hour, Sonali's entire family, her husband, her sons, her parents, and also her friend Orlantha and her friend's mother Beulah were all killed. Oh my God. To use Sonali's words, her life as she knew it ended.

[39:20] Susan Blackwell: When you said the name of the book, I was like, is it related to the movie? Because didn't um Naomi Watts do a movie?

[39:31] Laura Camien: I think she did. I yeah, I don't I haven't watched it.

[39:35] Susan Blackwell: It it is intense. This story. I haven't watched it either. And when you tell me that Fiona Shaw then married this woman, my mind is like sparking off so much I can't even I can't even talk. These connections between the loss, the oh god, yeah. It's intense. It's it's hard. It's hard. It's hard.

[40:04] Laura Camien: So it took, as you can imagine, it took Sonali years to process through this loss and this destruction. For about two years, she stayed at a relative's house in Sri Lanka in a darkened room. And she was essentially guarded by friends and family in an attempt to keep her safe and tended to and distracted and alive during a time when she did not want to be alive at all. Oh God. And according to Sonali, so many everyday images, things that we generally think of as positive, but just everyday things like sunshine, a blade of grass, a man's shoe, a dimple on a child's face, the smell of bread would fill her with terror. So she tried, she said she tried to shrink her sight and minimize her exposure to anything that would remind her of her life before and what she had lost, which I mean everything.

So she just stayed in this darkened room and essentially numbed herself by any means necessary. So by alcohol or by tablets, like she just tried to, well, I'll use her words, minimize her sight. She tried to minimize her exposure and shrink her sight so that she wouldn't be hit struck by this terror.

[41:33] Susan Blackwell: It's just so much pain. It's just like it's hard. Um it's hard to fathom. That much loss. And just I I, you know, how she survived when they didn't, like I any person who survived that tsunami, I understand is like it's just some sheer luck.

[41:55] Laura Camien: Yeah.

[41:56] Susan Blackwell: Of some tiny little change in circumstance for them in the midst of it all that didn't happen for others who were in the water.

[42:04] Laura Camien: Yeah. I have listened to her story told by her and her writing, and I was thinking about that, like because of, and she describes it so clearly, moment by moment. But imagine water, just like this massive roaring current, say it's going 55 or 60 miles per hour, is moving you across trees and overturned cars, and you're banging into things and getting cut up by things.

[42:41] Susan Blackwell: And I was like, the chance of her and moving you fast, you know, mile after mile after mile really fast. Yeah, that she survived the odds that she survived are just nuts. And she just happened to, she describes it where this water is moving her, and she saw a branch, a tree branch, and she stuck her arms up and back, not thinking, just reacting and responding viscerally and physically, and caught it and held on to it. And that is what she held on to until the water receded, and she was just sort of left in this muddy, desolate wasteland. So she pulled herself up out of the water a little bit, or like just enough, like holding on and the water passed her. I think she held on to it until because it's a big wave, so it comes in and eventually it goes back out.

[43:36] Laura Camien: Well, I was gonna say that even if she's stationary now because she's holding on to this branch, there is still stuff in that water that can knock into her slice, slice a person, cut a person. I just yeah, it's terrifying.

[43:52] Susan Blackwell: Yeah, I thought it was so interesting though, when I'll talk more about her creative process around writing this book, but I thought it was so interesting. She talked about how writing about the wave, she calls it the wave. Writing about the wave was not where the terror came from for her. Lot not a fear of like water or oceans. It was the terror of the things that would trigger her memories of her life before. I thought that was really fascinating. Because what would happen if she thought about it would like open up a um an opening for too much pain to fly. I think it was so excruciatingly painful for such a prolonged a period of time because of the the immensity of the loss. She likened it the loss to a meteorite hitting the earth and the extinction of the dinosaurs in a moment.

But she's talking about her family. And she said that for years she was just in this stupor of disbelief. And one of the manifestations of her trauma was not only did it really happen, but did my family even exist? Did I wipe my boys' noses? Did my husband come in at six o'clock and throw his keys on the, you know, counter?

[45:15] Oh no.

[45:15] Laura Camien: And so she had this long period of this traumatic almost like what is real? Because if you can imagine the cognitive dissonance of that, of going from the kids are jumping up and down on the bed, we're just wrapping up, we're packing our bags and trying to get our shit together to get out of the hotel in the next hour. And a friend being like, Man, I'd love to start a family. What you have is a dream, and the next moment you're essentially running for your life. But she had this very long period of seeking numbness and seeking forgetting. And eventually she landed in New York City. And she worked with a therapist who encouraged her to write about her experiences. And she said she thought it was ridiculous.

She didn't want to live, let alone write. So she was just like, Oh my God, are you kidding me? The other thing that's so great about her writing is it's so honest. It's so frank. And she, I don't know, man, like she pulls no punches. And sometimes, you know, it's a little bit like when we've talked about this with David Sidera. Sometimes that's not flattering to her.

[46:27] Yeah.

[46:28] Laura Camien: Because she really tells you what thoughts were going through her head. And especially after the wave and after all that loss, there was a lot of anger.

[46:38] Yeah.

[46:38] Susan Blackwell: And a lot of like, fuck you, are you fucking kidding me? Like a lot of anger and and so, but she's she's so honest about it. In my opinion, I think that when people are that honest to the degree where it's not flattering for themselves, I appreciate it so much. And I feel like that is how we heal because we learn that other people have those thoughts that have run through their minds as well. Because if we're being honest with ourselves, we have some ugly thoughts that run through our minds.

[47:08] Yeah.

[47:09] Laura Camien: And it's, you know, part of being human. And I appreciate it when someone can be that honest. I really appreciated it. So she, you know, the therapist is suggesting, why don't you write about this? And she was like, You're fuck that and fuck you. But she said eventually she began writing, much kicking and screaming, but she eventually began writing, and I stress this for herself. She wrote for herself to understand what happened to her, to write about the water and the wave and what happened on that day. And even though she had experienced the wave and the water and what happened on that day, she said there was still that it felt biblical or mythic. And she wanted to understand what actually happened to her in the water. And to do that, she had to put herself back there to grasp the impossibly unreal experience.

[48:08] Laura Camien: And as she wrote, she remembered all kinds of startling facts from that day. She was kind of recovering memories that were coming back to her. She remembered floating on. There was a moment where she was being moved by the water, and she was floating on her back in these rapids, looking up at a spotless blue sky. Because remember, this wasn't caused by a storm. This was caused by tectonic shift under the ocean, essentially an earthquake under the ocean. So she's looking up at the spotless blue sky, seeing a flock of birds flying in formation in the same direction as the water was taking her. And her whole family loved birds and bird watching. There's a lot of beautiful bird imagery in this book.

But she is laying there in the middle of this fucking tsunami, and she's looking up in there and she's like, Are those kind of storks? Are those? Those are painted storks, and thinking, Oh, Vic would love seeing those painted storks. And she remembered how little facts like that were so important for her because it helped her to bring reality back to herself and her life. And also to grasp the bizarre and the unfathomable about the whole situation. She said writing about the wave and the water was the easy part. And as I mentioned earlier, gradually over the years, she wrote more and more, and she wrote to bring her family back to her, to bring back the threads of her life and to remember it, not just intellectually, but to remember the feelings.

And for her, that was hard in the same way that I think it was a terror about the blade of grass, the smell of bread, a man's shoe. It was hard to remember and write about making breakfast for her boys in the kitchen and her boys messing around with the eggs and her, you know, yeah, scolding them, and that it was painful and terrifying to remember that.

[50:03] Laura Camien: But she said, even though remembering and writing about her life before was agony, it was a better quality of agony than trying to forget. I felt that I was cohering in a certain sort of way. From the moment it happened, I felt like I was in bits and pieces spinning around. And the writing, especially bringing my family close and writing about them, I felt myself cohering. This is who I really am.

[50:44] Susan Blackwell: I can only imagine because she endured it for so long that it felt like she wasn't moving. But you see, it's sort of like a photo developing or the sun rising. You see her grief progressing and moving and it's shifting. It's incredible. I just kept thinking about, and I'm jumping to what do we make of it, but I just kept thinking about if you are lucky enough to live long enough, we all are going to go through some shit to varying degrees. And I will remember this book the next time I am going through something as a reminder of a lot of things. And one of the things is to keep putting one foot in front of the other, to continue trying, even when it's terrifying to be self-expressed, in order to keep moving, in order to keep like moving through the pain and the grief of it all.

[51:42] Laura Camien: Yeah.

[51:43] Susan Blackwell: Absolutely. I mean, in that way, the title is genius. The wave is, I mean, the grief comes in waves. And the fact that she was able to, thanks to that therapist who it seemed like she wanted to tell, you know, to fuck off when she had the idea of writing.

[52:02] Laura Camien: She also stresses they were a very good therapist.

[52:04] Susan Blackwell: Yeah.

[52:05] Laura Camien: Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[52:05] Susan Blackwell: I feel like I got that from what you said. Um, and that she obviously followed through on it, and how great that she was able to start writing at a certain point. And it is like the wave, you can actually see her process happening as she's writing.

[52:26] Laura Camien: Yeah.

[52:27] Susan Blackwell: It's extraordinary.

[52:28] Laura Camien: Yeah, yeah.

[52:29] Susan Blackwell: That writing also paved the way for her to take important steps, like returning to her family home in London, which her friends had tended to while she was healing from the trauma. And through the writing, she realized that what they had as a family was so beautiful, and she wanted to experience it again. She was able to move through the terror and get back to wanting to experience it again and not just write about it from memory. So after years, she went back, and as I said, her friends had kept her home exactly as she had left it years earlier. There were still toys unopened, like Christmas presents waiting there.

[53:09] Laura Camien: Oh from because they had there were things that they were gonna open when they got back from their holiday.

[53:15] Susan Blackwell: Um, the beds were still made just as they had left it, the kids' cricket equipment and stuff like that. And she said, as impossible as it was to return, she felt an ease and a lightness. And while this writing was originally for her and an extension of her therapy, what she ultimately created from all of this was this book called Wave, which recounts her experiences in the tsunami and the progression of her grief over the ensuing years. And Laura, we frequently say, if you have to live through it, if you have the choice, but you could make something out of it, and boy, did she make something out of it.

[53:54] Laura Camien: Boy, did she?

[53:56] Susan Blackwell: It is so well written. This book is so well written. As I mentioned, it's very honest, it is unsentimental. The nuance, the detail, the richness, there are details that you would not believe if you saw them portrayed in a movie. But she is so factual and she's such a reliable narrator. You're like, yeah, that's how that went down.

[54:20] Laura Camien: I just keep thinking, and as we heal ourselves, we heal others.

[54:25] Susan Blackwell: Yeah.

[54:26] Laura Camien: You know, if we are willing to share truly and authentically what comes out of our pain, I do believe we have the opportunity to heal others.

[54:39] Susan Blackwell: Yeah, I agree with that, Laura. It's creation about destruction, it's creation out of destruction. Um, I watched this great talk with her at the Clinton School, and when asked what readers might take away from her book, she said, Well, you know, that's up to each reader. But she offered the theme of love endures. Even when life vanishes in an instant, even in the absence of the physical form, love doesn't die.

[55:13] Laura Camien: Which I thought was, I mean, you know, because you recently taught a beautiful session on story structure. Theme isn't really open to interpretation. And it's just it's important for authors, writers to know what the theme is. But I was like, that's a beautiful potential theme for that. Um, the book was released, Cheryl Strayed wrote about it for the New York Times, and these are Cheryl's words.

[55:38] Susan Blackwell: The word brave is used a lot to describe those who write about their deepest traumas, too often, I think, but it's an apt description of Durana Yagala. She has fearlessly delivered on memoir's greatest promise to tell it like it is, no matter the cost. The result is an unforgettable book that isn't only as unsparing as they come, but also defiantly flooded with light.

[56:02] Laura Camien: So apparently, after reading the book, Fiona Shaw contacted Sonali and wanted to meet her. And in an interview in Good Housekeeping, Fiona Shaw said, We spent half an hour chatting, and when I left, I thought, I have just met life.

[56:20] Susan Blackwell: Oh.

[56:21] Laura Camien: And in 2018, they started dating, and the couple got married after Sonali proposed to Fiona, and they are still together to this day.

[56:30] Susan Blackwell: Laura Camien just lost it.

[56:32] Laura Camien: I'm sorry. I can't even say those words back, but um I have just met life.

[56:33] Susan Blackwell: I have just met life. That's that's an incredible thing to express about someone and about someone who has gone through what we know.

[56:52] Laura Camien: Yeah, she's gone through so much loss, so much destruction.

[56:56] Susan Blackwell: Oh Suze, what an amazing spark.

[57:01] Laura Camien: Oh Laura. I feel like I put you through the washing machine.

[57:05] Susan Blackwell: You did, but I don't mind it.

[57:08] Laura Camien: I don't mind.

[57:09] Susan Blackwell: We like I'll take that room.

[57:11] Laura Camien: We like a good cry here at the Sparks File. While Laura, while Laura wipes her tears on the sleeve of her sweatshirt, let's do a little what do we make of it. So if you're Sonali, Durana Yakala, you make a book and super bonus. She's also an economist, and she is using her powers to research the economic implications of natural disasters on poverty, especially.

[57:36] Susan Blackwell: Oh wow.

[57:37] Laura Camien: So whether it's a tsunami or a drought, which leads to famine, whether it's happening.

[57:43] Susan Blackwell: Yeah, whether it's Hurricane Katrina.

[57:46] Laura Camien: She's she is um, you know, partnering to do research. I think she's still at Columbia here in New York. She's really something. If you love theater or are a student of theater or acting or the classics, go to the sparkfile.com slash M E D E A and take in that Medea. Um if you're going through it, and Lord knows at some point if you live long enough, we're all gonna go through it. Know that if you choose, you can use your creative self-expression to process all of it.

[58:13] Susan Blackwell: If you choose, you can use the raw material of your lived experience to make something beautiful that may be of healing to yourself and to others. So those are a few, what do we make of it?

[58:32] Laura Camien: Amen.

[58:34] Susan Blackwell: Amen. How are you doing over there, baby cans?

[58:37] Laura Camien: Doing good, doing good. I just think about how often we really encourage um ourselves and others to take what may feel like the biggest pain point in your life and put it in the light and begin creating from it.

[58:59] Susan Blackwell: You can decide later if you want to share it with the world or not, right?

[59:03] Laura Camien: But to begin creating from destruction, as you've given us two glorious examples of that today. But creating from destruction and then um, you know, do it in service of yourself to heal yourself, and then decide if you want to use it to help others as well.

[59:25] Susan Blackwell: Yeah, I love that.

[59:26] Laura Camien: I love that.

[59:28] Susan Blackwell: And you know, what else?

[59:30] Laura Camien: Yeah, we were talking uh in the spark file today in Blaze about there are these things. I mean, uh, everybody has these there, but for the grace of God, go eyes. You know, these things that to varying degrees are just unfathomable. And it takes be patient with yourself and take the time you need.

[59:47] Susan Blackwell: That's right.

[59:53] Laura Camien: Therapy. A good therapist is always in good taste.

[59:57] Susan Blackwell: But I love the healing possibility of creativity.

[1:00:01] Laura Camien: I love it.

[1:00:02] Susan Blackwell: Me too.

[1:00:03] Laura Camien: I love it for ourselves and for the people that may one day get to take that in.

[1:00:09] Susan Blackwell: So me too.

[1:00:11] Laura Camien: All right, that's it. Friends, I hope you go watch that or listen to that Medea and read along.

[1:00:16] Susan Blackwell: You're in for a treat.

[1:00:19] Laura Camien: Uh, yeah.

[1:00:20] Susan Blackwell: You're in for a treat.

[1:00:22] Laura Camien: I love that you made that little thank you for that gift, Susan.

[1:00:25] Susan Blackwell: This whole thing was a gift and an extra special little gift on our website. I'm excited to go check it out.

[1:00:31] Laura Camien: You're a gift, Laura Camien.

[1:00:32] Susan Blackwell: That's it.

[1:00:33] Laura Camien: You are gift to sparklers.

[1:00:35] Susan Blackwell: You're all gifts.

[1:00:36] Laura Camien: Thanks, everybody.

[1:00:37] Susan Blackwell: This episode of the Sparks File was made on the lands of the Lenape people. And as always, we hope this put another bunch of sparks in your file. Listen, if there's a spark you'd like us to explore, or if you'd like to learn more about how to coach with us to bring your creative ideas to life, you can email us at the sparkfile at gmail.com or submit it through our website, thesparkfile.com. We will even happily take your feedback, but you know the price of admission.

[1:01:01] Laura Camien: First, you gotta share a creative risk that you've taken recently.

[1:01:05] Susan Blackwell: You can follow us on social at the sparkfile and be sure to subscribe, rate and five star review this podcast. It really does help other listeners find us.

[1:01:11] Laura Camien: Also, if you like this podcast, we hope you'll share it with people that you love.

[1:01:17] Susan Blackwell: And if you didn't like it, we will go full Medea on your ass.

[1:01:20] Laura Camien: You don't want that, do you?

[1:01:22] Susan Blackwell: Our father's father was the son, motherfuckers.

[1:01:28] Laura Camien: If something lights you up and gets your creative sparks flying, we are writing you a forever permission slip to make that thing that's been knocking at your door.

[1:01:38] Susan Blackwell: It's your turn to take that spark and fan it into a flame.

[1:01:43] Laura Camien: You know, you gotta take it and make it.

[1:01:50] Susan Blackwell: When I bope into something that inspires me, I dump it in the spark fire.

[1:01:58] Laura Camien: Spark fire could be something that I wanna take or how I wanna be.

[1:02:05] Susan Blackwell: I'll pump it in the spark fire.

[1:02:08] Laura Camien: Spark.

[1:02:09] Susan Blackwell: I jump into my spark fire.

[1:02:14] Laura Camien: Let's open up the spark fire.