Halli Zhang is the author of ‘child of bread and bees,’ chosen as the editorial favorite in prose in our ‘Bruised Knees and Gardenias’ issue.
Halli Zhang writes alone at night and decides it's the most beautiful thing she's ever seen. Somehow, her friends seem to share the sentiment. She is working on her first novel length project.
Tell us a little bit about ‘child of bread and bees’ and your process of writing.
Really it started as a fascination with experimental writing. my teacher said, ‘I hate books without speech marks. I refuse to read them.’ And I was sitting there thinking that stories without them felt so dreamy and soft. A lot more is left up to interpretation. A character’s thoughts can’t always be told from their spoken words. Seeing a world from this perspective, I saw my childhood and watched myself in third person. How many times had I been yelled at and been scared? I live a good life, but occasionally, I can be scared. To capture this experience of childhood I needed to have something soft. And so the story was born. I wrote it over several nights in bed on my phone. usually, I just write when the inspiration comes, which is at inconvenient times. Half my drafts are on random pieces of paper. It was all compiled and I thought, this is pretty good.
Who are some of your biggest inspirations?
I do really like fish… often if you look through my writing you will find them swimming in there. In terms of people, I watch many. My thanks go to my dear friends for always saying really, really stupid things that tend to inspire me. The founder of this magazine, Abigail Cain, is also a big inspiration of mine. Reading the ‘Sardine’ poem* pushed me to experiment more with my language and while I don’t know if I’ve reached that level yet, I love watching my words do silly things. Several artists on Instagram have planted ideas in my head about settings, vibes or colours, in particular Felicia Chiao with her melancholic, gentle drawings. Her art is proudly on my wall. I don’t remember names well, but if I’ve ever smiled at you, you have inspired me.
What’s next for you as a writer?
I want to pursue being a licensed architect and write on the side. Hopefully, I can publish a novel… I write so slowly that it is barely growing, but it is growing. The correct use of space and the shapes of light and windows are showing up more and more in my writing. One day, I wish that I can be successful enough in architecture that I can write whatever I want, or successful enough in writing that I can design whatever I want. In terms of writing, I want to be a traditionally published author. In terms of architecture, I want to be a starchitect. One of them is much more pursuable than the other. A book built like a house can show you the inside of my heart.
*Find the ‘Sardine’ poem revived in our archive of Can 1.