Labyrinths, Threads, Aeolus's Bag, and Other Connected Vessels: An Interview with Maria Papayanni

Maria Papayanni is one of the most acclaimed contemporary children's authors in Greece. Maria was born in Larisa in 1964. She studied Greek language and literature in Thessaloniki and worked as a journalist in radio and television, as well as for newspapers and magazines. Since the publication of her first book in 2001, Maria Papayanni has published thirty books for children and youth and a novel for adults. Her picturebook I Want to Win! was illustrated by Eve Tharlet and published in various languages by Minedition and in Greek by Patakis Publishers. She also writes librettos and theater plays. Maria Papayanni has won several awards, including the Greek IBBY and the Diavazo journal awards for her book As If By Magic (Os dia Magias) and the Diavazo journal and National Young Adult and Youth Book awards for her book The Lonesome Tree (To Dentro to Monacho). She also won the Greek IBBY award for her book Shoes with Wings (Papoutsia me Ftera). Maria Papayanni is Greece's nominee for the 2020 Hans Christian Andersen Award and her work has been included in the White Ravens catalog.

Maria, how do you start writing a book? What inspires you to write?

It usually starts with a "why." From a young age, I would always turn to stories—what we call in Greek the "red thread" of storytelling—to find my way out of the labyrinth, out of the big or small challenges of life. By making up stories, I would try to fill in the gaps or imagine the things I could not understand. This is how I persevered through difficult situations, by building parallel worlds. So, I always leave the door of the imagination open, and when a "why" begins to grow, I set course for the place where everything is possible.

Are there any autobiographical elements in your work? Do you write about what you have experienced, what you would like to experience, or about things that only exist in your imagination?

I write about the invisible hump that I carry on my back. I write about everything I have lived through and also about things that I have not experienced but somehow reside inside me. I draw from wells of things like details and little stories that I have passed by or heard or read about. Sometimes, I cannot even determine how they came to me. Life is the place you start from, but you are always trying to shed light to life's invisible, secret, most precious parts.

You mostly write for children, but you have also authored stories for older audiences. You write novels as well as shorter stories. And you have published stories that include images as well as stories that are not illustrated. How do you determine the genre you want to work with each time?

I never think that I have to write about a specific issue that is of interest to a specific age group. I follow the clues, connect the dots, and try to decode mental images. I strive to find the best way to tell the story. Now, why do I usually write for children? Perhaps it's because I am still haunted by the same questions, or because I find children's way of thinking absolutely poetic, or because, like them, I also still believe in happily-ever-afters. When I write for children, I am not thinking that I write for a naïve audience; I am rather thinking that I write for people who have stocks of courage and justness, people who consider it their obligation to find the thread that will help them break out of the labyrinth. And this moves me deeply.

Even when your stories are entirely fictional, they still recall reality. How do you achieve this effect? How do you attain this balance between truth and dream?

I think these are parallel worlds. Just like in life. Our dreams can reveal things that we could not have imagined otherwise, but it is also in our dreams...