Erin Morgensterns first book, The Night Circus, will be released on September 13th. She already has a movie deal in the works. Summit Entertainment bought the film rights to develop a motion picture based on the upcoming publication. Morgenstern joined Summits literary based presentations at Comic-Con this summer, including the Breaking Dawn movies and two other authors of source material Summit is adapting, Divergent's Veronica Roth and Warm Bodies' Issac Marion.
The Night Circus is set in a fantastical circus that magically appears at night. Two magicians battle as theyve been trained to since childhood, but as they compete they fall in love. Now cant you imagine some Hollywood megastars brooding it up as those emotionally tormented sorcerers, in lavish Circus costumes too?
Morgenstern herself exhibits a unique style fitting for a chronicler of the performing arts. She likes corsets, and the red stripes of the one she wore in San Diego was the only color in her all black ensemble. If you look up her website, youll see influences from Stephen King to J.K. Rowling. Youll also find out she has also painted her own deck of Tarot cards. We sat down with the emerging literary star and soon to be movie star in San Diego.
SG: Is getting a movie deal the dream for an author?
Erin Morgenstern: I had never thought about it and to have it happen before the book even comes out, I certainly never even fathomed. I didnt even think that it got to the movie deal stage before the book was out. So it is definitely amazing and a little bit unbelievable too.
SG: And for your first book too.
EM: Yeah, trying to just get into the publishing industry and starting out as a first time author, anything anyone ever told me never happens to debut authors is happening to me so.
SG: Do you see it as a movie when youre writing it?
EM: I see everything very visually. Im not sure it would be a proper movie but I definitely see everything in my head. I have a visual imagination. Sometimes Im just transcribing the things I see in my head. I do everything, like the directing and the lighting design. I know what it looks like in my head so Ill be curious to see what it actually looks like once its on proper film.
SG: Is that what you do when you read other books too?
EM: I do. I have trouble reading books that I cant visualize. Normally the books that I love are the ones that I can completely immerse myself in in my head.
SG: Why does the circus get a bad rap?
EM: I dont know, it really does. I think it probably has so many associations like animal abuse and no one likes clowns, that sort of thing. But I think there are a lot of aspects I love. I love Cirque du Soleil and that sort of a little bit elevated circus rather than a classic Barnum and Bailey sort of idea.
SG: Is there something about portraying it as a fantasy that elevates it for you?
EM: I think its some sort of magical experience to be had. Either a circus or a theater production, something that you go and have an experience I think is a different sort of entertainment than sitting and watching something. Its one of the reasons in my circus you wander around. You dont just sit in a seat and watch a show. I like that sort of active entertainment idea. I think the trappings of a circus lent itself well to having multiple tents and you walk around and choose what you see.
SG: Do you imagine there are all sorts of other stories going on at the same time as the characters were following?
EM: Oh, definitely. I think the circus is full of stories and everyone who goes to the circus has a story, everyone whos in the circus has his own story. I think that idea of everyone having overlapping stories is where the book came from because each character in the story, you focus on certain characters, each character has their own story. Its not one persons story with a lot of extraneous people just hanging along.
SG: Does putting 19th century fashions and corsets into a book help bring it back?
EM: I dont know. I like the whole steampunk aesthetic but Im not punk enough to be steampunk I think. It has a very interesting flavor to me, that whole era, the fashion and the feel of it. I think theres probably a reason why the steampunk stuff is very, very popular right now. I think its appealing as a visual and fashion statement for a lot of people.
SG: A lot of people shop vintage and join groups that dress from older eras, but do you feel theres a movement coming to bring old fashion back to the mainstream?
EM: I think there might be that reaction to everything being so modern and technical, that kind of nostalgic retro sort of feel. Ive noticed it in music a lot, a lot of new bands that sound like old bands which I think is kind of great that were living in a time where everything old is new again.
SG: Im not particularly into corsets but I think women look great in those old fashions. I dont know about men in knickers though.
EM: Oh, I like the ascots and hats. Hats should come back.
SG: I saw on your website you were a big Stephen King reader.
EM: Yes, when I was very young.
SG: I was too. What inspiration did you get from Stephen Kings work?
EM: Theres darkness and theres a lot of darkness, but he balances it well with light too. I was reading at a very, very young age. I started reading Stephen King when I was 11 or 12 because there was no YA section back when I was reading. I think his stories are also very epic. That whole Stephen King world feels like its real even when fantastical things happen in it. Thats one of the things I try to do with my own writing. Its magical but it seems like its grounded in reality.
SG: He doesnt overwrite either. He gets to the point. If it's 1000 pages, it's 1000 pages of story.
EM: I do too. I cant write a 1000 page at this point. Maybe someday but theres something about his writing. I love his book On Writing. Its one of my favorite writing instruction books and one of the things that I always go back to, he talks very early on about how writing is telepathy. Youre expressing a thought in your head and transmitting it through words to someone elses head and thats the thing I go back to all the time when Im writing, about transmitting this idea from my head to someone elses.
SG: What are your favorite King books?
EM: Oh, It was probably the one. Thats probably why there are no clowns in my circus, because I read It too many times. That and The Stand is my all time favorite. I havent read that many of his recent ones. Now that I have an e-reader Im tempted to do Under the Dome.
SG: Right, we wont have to carry around the heavy book.
EM: Thats my major bone, those heavy, heavy that I have to lug around.
SG: When you read J.K. Rowling, was that just as a fan?
EM: The first Harry Potter I read when I took a childrens literature class in college. I read it for class which is a really interesting introduction to it because youre reading all sorts of different childrens books and you could tell that it was something different. It had that sort of specialness. Immediately, I was in school, I had plenty of other things to do but I went out and got the other two published books at that point and read them, even though I didnt have to for class. I think the world she creates is so intoxicating, all the details of the food. Its a fun world to escape into.
SG: What is the deal with your Tarot cards?
EM: At the same time I was writing the book, I was painting a black and white Tarot deck. Its 78 cards. It took a very long time but Im kind of fascinated by Tarot and Tarot reading. Im not a very good Tarot reader but I love the symbolism and the iconography of it. There are some really beautiful Tarot decks out there. Its fun to see variations on themes so I wanted to try and do my own take on these very traditional sort of images.
SG: Did you create different symbols?
EM: I kind of put my own spins and flavors on it. Theres a little bit of an Alice in Wonderland feel. My Fool card is Alice chasing the rabbit down the rabbit hole. There are some references to my own book in there. The Hangman card I the Hangman from the acrobat tent.
SG: Whats the Death card?
EM: My Death card is a woman in a Victorian coat with her face hidden by an open umbrella. Thats actually a little bit of a reference to Neil Gaimans Death from the Sandman series.
SG: Can you read your own?
EM: I cant read my own because I see what I changed about them. I can see the ones that I changed my mind about what I wanted to do or I took forever to adjust to where things were in the cards. I see the whole history of the painting so its harder for me to read it just as a symbolic card. Other people tell me that they read very well though.
SG: How do you learn to draw and make images? Do you just see it and make it?
EM: I learned, in visual art especially, I took a class when I was very young, like seven, eight, nine, somewhere in there, based on a book called Drawing on the Right Side of the Brain. You learn to draw just what youre seeing in shapes and angles and not trying to draw the object. I think thats very interesting and it works for a lot of people. If I tried to draw a portrait and I was trying to make it look like the subject, I wouldnt be able to do it. But if I just draw the pieces of it, its easier to connect and that influences all of my art. I dont try to make it look like something.
SG: Youve said youre not a planner or outliner. Doesnt sound very structured, but what kept you working and doing it?
EM: I could write and write and write and I might not necessarily have a book at the end of the day. That was one of the things I learned. What works for me is just writing and exploring a setting or a character and just writing a lot. Then I have to go back and give it a structure and thats one of the things I learned through the whole publishing process, because the version of the book that I even started querying literary agents with, was a mess. It was sprawling and it had no plot and one of the things I learned from working with my agent is how to structure what I had. I think Im getting better at it but you could definitely write forever and write thousands and thousands of pages but you need a structure for it to have it be successful as a book.
SG: It doesnt sound like you were tweaking and tweaking the same pages, procrastinating.
EM: No, I was doing hardcore heavy construction. Every draft, I dont even know how many drafts it went through, because I had stages that could not be called proper drafts because they are just like being ripped to pieces. But I think it helps to tear apart what I had and reconstruct it. I kind of excavate when I write and I find different things just from writing. Sometimes I find things that work better than what I had so then I end up replacing things and that sort of thing.
SG: Funny about query letters. As a journalist, Ive never had success writing query letters.
EM: I had a lot of success with my original query letter. I think my query letter was probably better than the book at that point because I think the concept that I had was enticing and the circus itself was enticing, but it didnt have a story and it didnt have a plot. I was lucky enough to find an agent who saw the potential in what I had as a world and that it needed to have more of a plot.
SG: I could never get behind the fancy salacious preamble letters.
EM: I didnt do that either. I kind of just did the flavor. I didnt give a whole lot away, just the nocturnal circus and magical goings on beneath the surface is probably enough to be enticing.
The Night Circus is set in a fantastical circus that magically appears at night. Two magicians battle as theyve been trained to since childhood, but as they compete they fall in love. Now cant you imagine some Hollywood megastars brooding it up as those emotionally tormented sorcerers, in lavish Circus costumes too?
Morgenstern herself exhibits a unique style fitting for a chronicler of the performing arts. She likes corsets, and the red stripes of the one she wore in San Diego was the only color in her all black ensemble. If you look up her website, youll see influences from Stephen King to J.K. Rowling. Youll also find out she has also painted her own deck of Tarot cards. We sat down with the emerging literary star and soon to be movie star in San Diego.
SG: Is getting a movie deal the dream for an author?
Erin Morgenstern: I had never thought about it and to have it happen before the book even comes out, I certainly never even fathomed. I didnt even think that it got to the movie deal stage before the book was out. So it is definitely amazing and a little bit unbelievable too.
SG: And for your first book too.
EM: Yeah, trying to just get into the publishing industry and starting out as a first time author, anything anyone ever told me never happens to debut authors is happening to me so.
SG: Do you see it as a movie when youre writing it?
EM: I see everything very visually. Im not sure it would be a proper movie but I definitely see everything in my head. I have a visual imagination. Sometimes Im just transcribing the things I see in my head. I do everything, like the directing and the lighting design. I know what it looks like in my head so Ill be curious to see what it actually looks like once its on proper film.
SG: Is that what you do when you read other books too?
EM: I do. I have trouble reading books that I cant visualize. Normally the books that I love are the ones that I can completely immerse myself in in my head.
SG: Why does the circus get a bad rap?
EM: I dont know, it really does. I think it probably has so many associations like animal abuse and no one likes clowns, that sort of thing. But I think there are a lot of aspects I love. I love Cirque du Soleil and that sort of a little bit elevated circus rather than a classic Barnum and Bailey sort of idea.
SG: Is there something about portraying it as a fantasy that elevates it for you?
EM: I think its some sort of magical experience to be had. Either a circus or a theater production, something that you go and have an experience I think is a different sort of entertainment than sitting and watching something. Its one of the reasons in my circus you wander around. You dont just sit in a seat and watch a show. I like that sort of active entertainment idea. I think the trappings of a circus lent itself well to having multiple tents and you walk around and choose what you see.
SG: Do you imagine there are all sorts of other stories going on at the same time as the characters were following?
EM: Oh, definitely. I think the circus is full of stories and everyone who goes to the circus has a story, everyone whos in the circus has his own story. I think that idea of everyone having overlapping stories is where the book came from because each character in the story, you focus on certain characters, each character has their own story. Its not one persons story with a lot of extraneous people just hanging along.
SG: Does putting 19th century fashions and corsets into a book help bring it back?
EM: I dont know. I like the whole steampunk aesthetic but Im not punk enough to be steampunk I think. It has a very interesting flavor to me, that whole era, the fashion and the feel of it. I think theres probably a reason why the steampunk stuff is very, very popular right now. I think its appealing as a visual and fashion statement for a lot of people.
SG: A lot of people shop vintage and join groups that dress from older eras, but do you feel theres a movement coming to bring old fashion back to the mainstream?
EM: I think there might be that reaction to everything being so modern and technical, that kind of nostalgic retro sort of feel. Ive noticed it in music a lot, a lot of new bands that sound like old bands which I think is kind of great that were living in a time where everything old is new again.
SG: Im not particularly into corsets but I think women look great in those old fashions. I dont know about men in knickers though.
EM: Oh, I like the ascots and hats. Hats should come back.
SG: I saw on your website you were a big Stephen King reader.
EM: Yes, when I was very young.
SG: I was too. What inspiration did you get from Stephen Kings work?
EM: Theres darkness and theres a lot of darkness, but he balances it well with light too. I was reading at a very, very young age. I started reading Stephen King when I was 11 or 12 because there was no YA section back when I was reading. I think his stories are also very epic. That whole Stephen King world feels like its real even when fantastical things happen in it. Thats one of the things I try to do with my own writing. Its magical but it seems like its grounded in reality.
SG: He doesnt overwrite either. He gets to the point. If it's 1000 pages, it's 1000 pages of story.
EM: I do too. I cant write a 1000 page at this point. Maybe someday but theres something about his writing. I love his book On Writing. Its one of my favorite writing instruction books and one of the things that I always go back to, he talks very early on about how writing is telepathy. Youre expressing a thought in your head and transmitting it through words to someone elses head and thats the thing I go back to all the time when Im writing, about transmitting this idea from my head to someone elses.
SG: What are your favorite King books?
EM: Oh, It was probably the one. Thats probably why there are no clowns in my circus, because I read It too many times. That and The Stand is my all time favorite. I havent read that many of his recent ones. Now that I have an e-reader Im tempted to do Under the Dome.
SG: Right, we wont have to carry around the heavy book.
EM: Thats my major bone, those heavy, heavy that I have to lug around.
SG: When you read J.K. Rowling, was that just as a fan?
EM: The first Harry Potter I read when I took a childrens literature class in college. I read it for class which is a really interesting introduction to it because youre reading all sorts of different childrens books and you could tell that it was something different. It had that sort of specialness. Immediately, I was in school, I had plenty of other things to do but I went out and got the other two published books at that point and read them, even though I didnt have to for class. I think the world she creates is so intoxicating, all the details of the food. Its a fun world to escape into.
SG: What is the deal with your Tarot cards?
EM: At the same time I was writing the book, I was painting a black and white Tarot deck. Its 78 cards. It took a very long time but Im kind of fascinated by Tarot and Tarot reading. Im not a very good Tarot reader but I love the symbolism and the iconography of it. There are some really beautiful Tarot decks out there. Its fun to see variations on themes so I wanted to try and do my own take on these very traditional sort of images.
SG: Did you create different symbols?
EM: I kind of put my own spins and flavors on it. Theres a little bit of an Alice in Wonderland feel. My Fool card is Alice chasing the rabbit down the rabbit hole. There are some references to my own book in there. The Hangman card I the Hangman from the acrobat tent.
SG: Whats the Death card?
EM: My Death card is a woman in a Victorian coat with her face hidden by an open umbrella. Thats actually a little bit of a reference to Neil Gaimans Death from the Sandman series.
SG: Can you read your own?
EM: I cant read my own because I see what I changed about them. I can see the ones that I changed my mind about what I wanted to do or I took forever to adjust to where things were in the cards. I see the whole history of the painting so its harder for me to read it just as a symbolic card. Other people tell me that they read very well though.
SG: How do you learn to draw and make images? Do you just see it and make it?
EM: I learned, in visual art especially, I took a class when I was very young, like seven, eight, nine, somewhere in there, based on a book called Drawing on the Right Side of the Brain. You learn to draw just what youre seeing in shapes and angles and not trying to draw the object. I think thats very interesting and it works for a lot of people. If I tried to draw a portrait and I was trying to make it look like the subject, I wouldnt be able to do it. But if I just draw the pieces of it, its easier to connect and that influences all of my art. I dont try to make it look like something.
SG: Youve said youre not a planner or outliner. Doesnt sound very structured, but what kept you working and doing it?
EM: I could write and write and write and I might not necessarily have a book at the end of the day. That was one of the things I learned. What works for me is just writing and exploring a setting or a character and just writing a lot. Then I have to go back and give it a structure and thats one of the things I learned through the whole publishing process, because the version of the book that I even started querying literary agents with, was a mess. It was sprawling and it had no plot and one of the things I learned from working with my agent is how to structure what I had. I think Im getting better at it but you could definitely write forever and write thousands and thousands of pages but you need a structure for it to have it be successful as a book.
SG: It doesnt sound like you were tweaking and tweaking the same pages, procrastinating.
EM: No, I was doing hardcore heavy construction. Every draft, I dont even know how many drafts it went through, because I had stages that could not be called proper drafts because they are just like being ripped to pieces. But I think it helps to tear apart what I had and reconstruct it. I kind of excavate when I write and I find different things just from writing. Sometimes I find things that work better than what I had so then I end up replacing things and that sort of thing.
SG: Funny about query letters. As a journalist, Ive never had success writing query letters.
EM: I had a lot of success with my original query letter. I think my query letter was probably better than the book at that point because I think the concept that I had was enticing and the circus itself was enticing, but it didnt have a story and it didnt have a plot. I was lucky enough to find an agent who saw the potential in what I had as a world and that it needed to have more of a plot.
SG: I could never get behind the fancy salacious preamble letters.
EM: I didnt do that either. I kind of just did the flavor. I didnt give a whole lot away, just the nocturnal circus and magical goings on beneath the surface is probably enough to be enticing.