A Conversation with Glenn Patterson

Abstract

Glenn Patterson was born in 1961 and grew up on a Protestant estate in Belfast. As a teenager he was involved in Orange Marches, and he witnessed the sudden rise in sectarian violence. In order to escape from Northern Ireland, he went to England to study creative writing at the University of East Anglia, but he returned to the province in 1988 to become Writer in the Community for the city of Lisburn. He has since written six novels and been involved in a number of docu mentaries for both the BBC and RTfi. His first novel, Burning Your Own (1988), is set in Belfast during 1969. It won the Betty Trask Award as well as the Rooney Prize. His second novel, Fat Lad (1992), won the Guinness Peat Aviation Book Award. It is told from the perspective of a young man who has returned to Belfast after living in England for many years. Black Night at Big Thunder Moun tain (1995) involves a character from Belfast who has gone to work at the Euro Disney construction site. The International (1999) takes place in a hotel shortly before the Civil Rights marches begin. Numbers (2003) explores the lives of dif ferent families that live in a particular house over the course of four decades. That Which Was (2004) is set in contemporary Belfast and examines the inter sections between memory and history. His most recent publication, Lapsed Protestant (2006), is a collection of his nonfiction. Patterson is currently a writer in residence at the Seamus Heaney Centre, affiliated with Queen's University Belfast. We met at a coffeeshop on Fountain Street in Belfast.1 Patterson is tall, slen der, and his blonde hair is streaked with grey. He stands with his hands in his back-pockets, not quite slouching, and he is immediately friendly. One or two people in the coffeeshop wave to him and he smiles back. When our tea arrives and we settle down to talk, Patterson grows suddenly serious and ready to dis cuss his work.